Debunking 8 Social Security Myths on Its 80th Birthday

August 14 marks the 80th birthday of the Social Security program, which was established in the Social Security Act of 1935. Over the past 80 years, Social Security has provided important cash benefits and income security to seniors, survivors, individuals with disabilities, and their families – including to nearly 60 million people today.

Yet Social Security is on a financially unsustainable course – and is not on track to be able to pay full benefits through its 100th birthday. Last year, the program paid $73 billion more in benefits than it raised from taxes. As the more of the baby boom population retires and Americans continue living longer, that gap is projected to grow – depleting the trust fund reserves of the disability program late next year and the old age program in the early- to mid-2030s. Failure to address the gap between spending and revenue could result in an immediate 19 percent cut to all workers with disabilities, and a 20 to 30 percent across-the-board cut to retirees.

Sadly, instead of identifying solutions to prevent depletion of the trust funds, many commenters have relied on myths and half-truths to avoid having a conversation about the necessary choices. In this paper, we identify eight such myths – though there are many more:

• Myth #1: Social Security does not face a large funding shortfall
• Myth #2: Today’s workers will not receive Social Security benefits
• Myth #3: Social Security would be fine if we hadn’t “raided the trust fund”
• Myth #4: Social Security cannot run a deficit
• Myth #5: Social Security has nothing to do with the rest of the budget
• Myth #6: We don’t need to worry about Social Security for 20 years
• Myth #7: Social Security reform is code for slashing benefits, especially for the poor
• Myth #8: Social Security is too hard to fix

Below, we debunk these myths in the hopes that an honest discussion of the facts will lead policymakers to come together and put Social Security on a sustainable path for the next 80 years.

See the full document below or download it here.

Update 8/17/2015: The original version of this paper described the changes needed to fix Social Security as “modest” while describing the changes that could gradually take place over time. We've updated the language to “incremental” for clarity.