- The Social Security Trust Funds will be depleted one year earlier – in 2040 – that was anticipated based on 2005 calculations.
- The year that Social Security will start paying out more than it takes in: 11 years from now, in 2017.
- The cost of maintaining Social Security over a 75-year long range period has increased from last year’s projection. It’s now $600 billion higher, due in part to lower returns from investment of current Social Security funds.
Interest earned on the invested assets of the combined Social Security Trust Funds was $94 billion in 2005. The rate of interest was 5.5 percent.
Four of the six Social Security Trustees are members of the Bush Administration: John W. Snow, Secretary of the Treasury and Managing Trustee; Jo Anne Barnhart, Commissioner of Social Security; Michael O. Leavitt, Secretary of Health and Human Services; and Elaine L. Chao, Secretary of Labor. The two public trustees are John L. Palmer and Thomas R. Saving.
Highlights of the Social Security Trustee report do not include whether the Bush administration continues the practice of taking money from Social Security accounts (and not paying it back) to fund other programs. You’ll find more information about this practice in The Looting of Social Security, an interesting book by Allen W. Smith.
Read the full 2006 Social Security Trustees Report
