Are we ready to do something about Social Security <em>yet?</em>

Because this won’t get any better. Not for forty years or so, if even then:

This year, the system will pay out more in benefits than it receives in payroll taxes, an important threshold it was not expected to cross until at least 2016, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Social Security is bleedin’ red! And that’s not a metaphor for socialism.

The Times blames the recession for bringing this along faster than expected, but that’s the point: it was expected. It’s been expected for a long time. And nothing’s been done to fix it.

Via Memeorandum.

Megan McArdle:

Every time I write anything about Social Security, I get at least one person arguing that everything is fine because after all, the trust fund is not going to run out until 2036 or so.

I want to assume good faith, but I have a hard time believing that anyone takes this argument seriously. Today, because social security payments exceeded revenue, we’re going to either have to raise taxes, or borrow more money, in order to cover the benefits.

How would this be different if we didn’t have the trust fund?

Yeah, too bad Uncle Sam wasn’t squirreling the money away someplace, putting it in some nice safe bonds or something, instead of spending it all for all these years.