Will the Problems Be Solved?

WILL the financial problems of social security, and the bad conditions for so many elderly, ever be solved? Yes, they will. That is an absolute certainty!

How will this come about? By some new idea in social security management? No, that is not likely in the Western world, because its financial affairs have steadily worsened in recent years.

Social Security’s Future

The problems of social security, as the system is now arranged, are expected to increase greatly before long. Last year, in the United States, social security payments exceeded taxes collected for that purpose by about three billion dollars.

This trend is picking up speed, as the number of elderly who are retiring increases. The amounts that will have to be paid out in the future to workers who are now contributing to social security are staggering. Some economists believe that those benefits never will be paid.

The Wall Street Journal noted that these obligations now already contracted, without considering increases in payments to offset inflation, will amount to at least a ‘2.5 trillion (2,500 billion dollars) projected deficit in the Social Security System.’ It added: “As liberals like to argue, the nation owes this debt to itself, and it will be paid off by raising taxes in the future. Of course this is nonsense. Increasing future taxes by these magnitudes can only disintegrate the tax base.”

What is wrong? For one thing, those who set up the social security program felt that an ever-growing population would supply an ever-larger number of young workers who would pay the taxes and take care of the elderly who were retiring. But that is not how things have worked out. Population trends in the United States are down, not up, as families are having fewer children.

Thus the huge flood of new workers to pay taxes has not materialized. Instead, there is a growing tide of older retired people that must be supported by proportionately fewer workers.

In Vital Speeches of the Day, corporation official William Cotter, who was part of a group appointed by the government to look into the problem, said this:

“Since current retirees will now receive their benefits from current workers, the number of workers per retiree becomes an important calculation.

“When the system was instituted, there were 7 workers providing taxes for each retiree receiving benefits. At the present time, there are just 3 workers for every retiree. And that ratio is declining.

“Our task force, using Bureau of the Census population extrapolations, estimated that by the end of the century, there will be but 3 workers for every two retirees.”

Obviously that will mean an impossible tax burden to bear. This is why some experts feel that the program is headed toward certain bankruptcy, or, at the very least, radical change. They say that since the system cannot pay for itself even now, there is no way it can do so when far heavier burdens are placed upon it in the future. Thus, a special investment bulletin from the American Institute for Economic Research declared:

“That benefits for those entitled to receive them under the Social Security Act and numerous private pension plans are in jeopardy is readily apparent.

“The old age pension aspect of Social Security has become a self-destruct mechanism tending to impoverish those who must pay Social Security taxes in the years ahead and to increase the risk that those entitled to benefits may not receive them.”

Government Rescue?

Can the government come to the rescue? That is what some hope. But as The Wall Street Journal points out: “The federal government, believe it or not, is in the same boat.”

The government of the United States, as is the case with many others, is having the same difficulty​—expenses keep growing faster than income. The deficit in the government’s budget for fiscal 1975 was about $43 billion. The deficit for fiscal 1976 is expected to be about $70 billion. These are the largest deficits in peacetime history. And the national debt is approaching $600 billion.

Since government debts are so huge already, any hope that the vast future payments of social security can be made by government funds is unrealistic, many economists feel.

Also, history shows much instability of governments, leaders, social systems and economic arrangements. So to put one’s trust in failing human institutions for security does not make sense.

What the Future Holds

What people need is a far better system of security than anything humans have yet devised. They desperately need a permanent end to insecurity.

Is there a genuine, realistic hope for that kind of security? Yes, there is! And today’s unsettled conditions merely serve to corroborate the reality of that hope.

Bible prophecy clearly foretold that this present system of things would enter a “time of the end,” or a period called “the last days” when all human institutions would experience great distress and failure. (Dan. 11:40; 2 Tim. 3:1-5; Matt. 24:3-14) The very conditions that now exist world wide signify that we are in this time.

This means that the time is actually at hand when mankind’s Creator, Jehovah God, will intervene in man’s affairs to set things straight here on earth. Jesus Christ told his followers to look forward to this when he spoke of God’s government, his heavenly kingdom, controlling the earth at the appointed time. (Matt. 6:9, 10) Hence, we are getting very near to the day when the present unsatisfactory system of things will be crushed out of existence to make way for a new order under God’s direction.​—2 Pet. 3:13.

Bible prophecy foretells that in God’s new order there will be no more insecurity of any kind to mar the happiness of earth’s inhabitants. Gone will be all war, hunger, greed, economic competition and oppression. Instead, people “will indeed find their exquisite delight in the abundance of peace,” with true “security to time indefinite.” How welcome that will be in view of today’s growing insecurity!​—Ps. 37:11; Isa. 32:17.