Social Security and it Challenges

There are a lot of difficulty and challenges around Social Security system right now. Social Security will be there in the future, and it will be there for you today if you need it.

There are a lot of difficulty and challenges around Social Security system right now. Social Security will be there in the future, and it will be there for you today if you need it. It will look different in the future, but it will continue to be there and will evolve into what's needed for American workers and their families. You may have to contribute more, and you may be taxed on all of your benefits, but there will still be benefits.

Social Security and Medicare make up the largest part of our national budget. Social Security provides a minimum foundation of protection for retired workers and for workers who face a loss of income due to a disability or the death of a family wage earner. Social Security was never meant to be the sole source or retirement income for retirees.

The baby boomers, 76 million of them, will begin to retire in 2010, and as with everything else this group has done, it will have a big impact on the Social Security system and will put a strain on it. At that tine, there will be more retires and fewer workers paying into the system. Social Security is a pay-as-you-go system with most of the taxes being paid today going to fund current benefits. Excess funds are credited to the Social Security trust fund.

There is about $900 billion currently in the trust fund, but benefit payments are projected to exceed taxes in 2015, and the trust fund will be exhausted in 2037. If this does happen, the SSA will only be able to pay about 72 percent of benefits owed, using dollars that are coming in from workers paying into the system. Now, this is if nothing is done about the situation. Many people want the government to use our current budget surplus to mend the Social Security problems, while others want to privatize Social Security. The judges are still out on this, but there is time to fix the problem.