Back in college when I studied Social Security, my teachers were stating how the program was likely to run a deficit soon, and eventually run out of money.
Net income for OASI peaked in 2006, and hit a deficit in 2021. The deficit in 2024 was over $100 billion from reserves of $2.5 trillion.
If the $2.5 trillion was invested at a 6% growth rate, it would generate another $150 billion in revenue, which would cover the shortfall. But we are not diversifying OASI’s investments to higher interest payments because the government likes to have an easy way to cover the deficit with low-interest bonds.
The Social Security Administration predicts the OASI trust fund will be depleted in 2033 if nothing changes.
This means the government will need to find more money to cover the cost of retirees, print money risking inflation, or increase taxes. There are no good options anymore.
If we had invested the money properly starting in 2009 with an average 8% annual return we would likely have over $7 trillion in the OASI trust fund by now, even if we never deposited another penny into the trust fund.
| Year | Balance in millions |
| 2007 | $2,023,000.00 |
| 2008 | $2,023,000.00 |
| 2009 | $2,184,840.00 |
| 2010 | $2,359,627.20 |
| 2011 | $2,548,397.38 |
| 2012 | $2,752,269.17 |
| 2013 | $2,972,450.70 |
| 2014 | $3,210,246.76 |
| 2015 | $3,467,066.50 |
| 2016 | $3,744,431.82 |
| 2017 | $4,043,986.36 |
| 2018 | $4,367,505.27 |
| 2019 | $4,716,905.69 |
| 2020 | $5,094,258.15 |
| 2021 | $5,501,798.80 |
| 2022 | $5,941,942.70 |
| 2023 | $6,417,298.12 |
| 2024 | $6,930,681.97 |
| 2025 | $7,485,136.52 |
With an annual income of over $500 billion a year, there would be more than enough interest to cover the deficit for far longer than is currently projected while continuing to grow the fund.
Economists saw this coming and politicians did nothing.
We did not give people the option to diversify into a super annuation.
We did not properly invest the money to ensure there would be enough money in reserves to cover an aging population.
We decided to screw over the retirement of every millennial.
While I will be fine because I’m able to max out my retirement account, this is going to screw over so many of my fellow American millennials who do not have the income to max out their 401k contributions. It is going to screw over millions of Americans who do not know how to properly balance their retirement accounts using index funds for growth. It is going to screw over the millions of Americans in maximum benefit plans from their work who are at risk of both funds being underfunded when they retire.
Even giving people like me the ability to opt out of Social Security and put that money in a superannuation fund would save the government money while increasing my retirement account. But the government did not choose to do that. Democrats oppose it on principal, and Republicans refuse to do anything to help the middle class.
It was completely avoidable.
It makes me mad.
C’est la vie.
References:
https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/STATS/table4a1.html
https://www.ssa.gov/budget/assets/materials/2025/2025BST.pdf
