The bogus Trust Fund

The Social Security System is a microcosm of the government itself. It is hopelessly insolvent! That condition has been known for decades. Just like everything else, the government lies to the people about its condition and the condition of Social Security.
Charles Hugh Smith has written a terrific piece on Social Security. In his words, with his emboldening:

There are two frauds at the very heart of the Social Security system, and I am going to describe and source them in detail. After spending a number of hours poring over public data from the Social Security Administration (SSA), The U.S. Treasury and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), and additional hours searching the Web for other published analyses, I can state with some authority that there are no published analyses or accounts of Social Security which incorporate the actual outlays and receipts from fiscal year 2010 in a context which includes the Social Security Trust Fund.

Despite the reassurances provided by the government and its no-nothing lackies in the rented economics profession and the media , Social Security has crossed over the point where it can pay its bills. According to Smith, Social Security has a $76 billion shortfall this year. His detailed analysis uses only government figures, although they took some ingenuity to gather and put together.
If you believe that Social Security is sound, please email me regarding a bridge I have for sale in the borough of Brooklyn. It might be a better deal than Social Security, depending upon your age.
Smith concludes with:

The bogus Trust Fund and absurdly optimistic estimates constitute two fundamental frauds at the heart of the Social Security system. Forget the delusional propaganda estimates and look at the actual Treasury data for outlays and receipts. The system is not “secure;” it ran a $76 billion deficit in 2010, and it is on track to run a deficit in 2011 that it was not supposed to reach until 2025.

Wake up, America, and look at the data, not fantasies.