Today's Second Social Security Post

Another element of the report linked in the post immediately below strikes me as something worth writing about, since it will surely attract the attention of liberal bloggers, politicians and even economists:

For the trust funds to remain solvent throughout the 75-year projection period, the combined payroll tax rate could be increased during the period in a manner equivalent to an immediate and permanent increase of 1.92 percentage points, benefits could be reduced during the period in a manner equivalent to an immediate and permanent reduction of 12.8 percent, general revenue transfers equivalent to $4.0 trillion (in present value) could be made during the period, or some combination of approaches could be adopted.

Translation: "A payroll-tax increase is the most pedestrian possible solution to this problem, so we'll go ahead and suggest it so as not appear as if we have no ideas." And who can blame them for taking this approach?

Just so long as no one is tempted to take it too seriously. As much as both sides like to pretend that this is a cold, calculated, economic issue, it's not. At heart, how you tackle the obvious crisis in Social Security (yes, Mr. Krugman, there is one) is going to be colored by your answer to the question I allude to below: Whom do you trust more? Markets? Or Congress?

Congress has been a terrible steward of the "trust fund" so far. Our elected representatives are terrible stewards of just about everything. It's simply a fact of political life, and it's even partly our fault -- we expect them to give us the moon while wanting to pay only the price of a sea star in taxes. So as we consider the Social Security Trustees' recommendations, we need to think long and hard about whether depositing another 1.92 percentage points of our incomes in the laps of our politicians is really a feasible way of bolstering the system. Especially when, as the report goes on to say immediately after the passage quoted above, "[s]ignificantly larger changes would be required to maintain solvency beyond 75 years" anyway.