Social Security

CBO examines changes in family wealth from 1989 to 2022 using a measure of wealth that includes projected Social Security benefits. Over that period, family wealth was unevenly distributed, and wealth inequality increased.

Molly Dahl, CBO's Chief of Long-Term Analysis, testifies before the Senate Committee on the Budget.

In CBO’s projections, spending for Social Security rises relative to GDP over the next 75 years, and the gap between outlays and revenues widens. If combined, the balances in the program’s trust funds would be exhausted in fiscal year 2034.

CBO’s Director, Phillip Swagel, testifies before the House Ways and Means Committee’s Subcommittee on Social Security about the significant financial challenge the program faces in the coming decades.

In CBO’s projections, the U.S. population increases from 342 million people in 2024 to 383 million people in 2054. Net immigration increasingly drives population growth, accounting for all population growth beginning in 2040.

CBO issues a volume describing 17 policy options that would each reduce the federal budget deficit by more than $300 billion over the next 10 years or, in the case of Social Security options, have a comparably large effect in later decades.

CBO issues a volume that contains short descriptions of 59 policy options that would each reduce the federal budget deficit by less than $300 billion over the next 10 years.

CBO presents its projections of what federal deficits, debt, spending, and revenues would be for the next 30 years if current laws governing taxes and spending generally did not change.

In June 2019, CBO updated its long-term budget projections, including projections of the Social Security system’s finances. CBO compares those projections with its 2018 projections and with the Social Security trustees’ latest projections.

This interactive tool lets the user explore seven policy options that could be used to improve the finances of the Social Security program and delay the exhaustion of its trust funds.

This report and the accompanying interactive tool present CBO’s analysis of whether Social Security benefits enable retired workers to meet their basic needs and the extent to which benefits replace preretirement earnings.