Social Security: The Closer You Look, the Worse It Appears; Media Has Ignored for Months

Thanks to info "steveegg" at No Runny Eggs linked me to earlier today, I had to add the word "Annual" before "Cash Flow" at this post (at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog) that originally appeared Wednesday.

That's because the system is already running monthly deficits, and significant ones.

Back in February, the system also ran a deficit. It was bad news, but because February is an unusual month containing a full month of payments but only 20 business days of collections (actually 19, since Presidents Day is a federal holiday), I didn't think it was an indicator of a near-term problem when I noted it in early April. I was wrong.

The degree of the decay is obvious when you look at July's and August's results. The drastic decline in year-over-year collections noted in Wednesday's post indicate that September is almost certainly going to be no better, and will probably be worse.

Go to this link and you'll be able to replicate the tables that follow (simply type "7" or "8" at Item 3):

As you can see, the Old Age program was somewhat positive during July, but the Disability program's deficit pushed the overall result into the red.

August was much worse:

Both programs ran a cash deficit in August. I have to think that the $5.76 billion cash shortfall might be the worst performance in decades, and maybe ever. Given how poor overall September collections were through Monday compared to the similar period in 2008, September will almost definitely be worse.

What I have been calling the POR (Pelosi-Obama-Reid) Economy, now the POR Recession/"Repression" As Normal People Define It, since July of last year explains why things have gotten so bad so fast. But the more fundamental problem is that any and all attempts at reform have been stymied by the Democratic Party and the establishment media (but I repeat myself) for the better part of 15 years. Now that the fiscal chickens are coming home to roost, there is dead silence about all of this.

I suppose any mention of Social Security's scary decay would jeopardize the chances of passing state-run health care. We can't have that.

Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.