This discussion has been stimlating, and I've learned so much over the past few days from reading and thinking and considering your point of view. There is an awful lot to be thought about. And the moral uprightness of developing huge reserves in the S.S. fund that became conveniently available to finance war and tax cuts for the rich deserves careful analysis that doesn't yield easy conclusions.

What I'm coming to conclude is that there is plenty of criticism one can make of everyone involved, and that includes the general public. This way of doing our nation's business has prevailed because we were all getting over . . . which can't go on forever.

To begin with, Social Security has been a sweet deal for the nation's elders and disabled and survivors of those with benefits. Even back when I was in high school, history teachers (mine were left leaning) told us that most people got way more in benefits than they put in. Anyone can verify that with a little on-line research. It kinda is a Ponzi scheme. That's not as ugly a truth as the Right tries to make it. My father's generation didn't mind all that much having some income redistributed from their incomes to those of my grandparents generation. My grandparents generation had suffered terribly during the depression. Many had fought in WWI and/or lost sons in WWII. Many had endured very tough working conditions, when they managed to have jobs. Women my grandmother's age got brown lung and TB working in textile mills. Often this generation started full-time work at the age of 14. It wasn't hard to sell the idea that the country kind of owed them something. Also, back then, the alternative for many would have been depending on support from their children. So there there was no hue and cry raised by the public when my grandparents' generation got back 14 times what they paid in. Besides, my parents' generation were slated to get back way more than they put in. And they did get it. I'll get back way more than I put in, given a normal life span.

Supporters of Social Security, back in the day, optimistically and sincerely believed that the value if the U.S. economy would keep on growing by leaps and bounds. Paying FICA taxes was sort of like buying stock in America. Someday it would pay off better than most stocks were likely to.

You correctly identify 1983 as a turning point. By then, it was impossible to ignore that Social Security couldn't keep paying out as generously as it had. It was facing insolvency. So there was a crisis. However, they more than fixed it. The motives were not dark, IMO. They didn't want to have to keep coming back to this issue every few years. So they made sure there would be enough of surplus accumulation to handle the baby boom retirement. At this point, it was also apparent that my generation was barely replacing itself with new kids. The economy certainly wasn't as robust in the 70s and early 80s as it had been in th 50s an 60s.

Moynihan, himself , said that young people were starting to realize that S.S. wouldn't be the eventual bonanza for them that it had been for their grandparents and parents. Meanwhile, they saw housing and stock values zooming up. So they wanted to keep more income to buy bigger houses and put more in their IRAs. Moynihan wanted to accomodate that. I do believe his motives were decent. So he wanted to stick with pay-as-you-go.

When we hear about Social Security fixing to go less than perfectly solvent in 2033, that's not to do with anyone stealing. That is expected to happen even if the Treasury makes good on paying every single one of those Treasury Bonds that are in the trust fund.

The surplus funds were invested - in Treasury securities, which do pay interest. That is how the law requires them to be invested. Sure, there is a chance that the Treasury will default on paying off the SSA when it goes to cash those bonds in. Maybe they won't pay the Chinese, either, who hold a lot of U.S. Treasury securities. But I don't see the Chinese worrying. So I'm not too worried either.

The Treasury has been paying interest on Treasury securities to the SSA, which is currently being used to help pay the benefits folks are currently receiving. When the time comes that the SSA has to start cashing in those bonds, it is entirely likely that the U.S. government will find the money to do so by selling more bonds to China and everyone else who likes to by U.S. Treasury bonds. When those people want to cash in their bonds, they will sell them to the Federal Reserve. Guess where the Federal Reserve will get the money. (?) It will come directly out of the thin air. Yup . . . they just turn on the printing presses.