Point one: Right, but, depending upon whose numbers you use in 2018 we stop putting money into the trust fund and start pulling from it. Also, it's not really a trust fund. Excess funding does go into a trust fund but it is then lent to the Treasury and spent. Instead of using the power of time to get a decent rate of return it's basically sitting.

Two, I agree, mostly. Since SS depends upon multiple workers for every payee, as the birth rate grows taxes increase or benefits decrease. As either happens it stops being perceived as a retirement plan (which the general public currently does) and starts being perceived as welfare.

On the third point, I don't disagree at all on how many people live off of it. Our generation expects a much, much higher quality of living than our parents and grandparents. $1,000 a month is barely enough to pay for the cost of very basic living. Think no vacations, meager meals, no cable TV, no going out for movies, etc.

The terrible thing is, if that money had been invested instead of sitting like it has, those people could easily be living on man, many times that.

I think far less people would have issues with parking a mandatory 12% of their income into investments than letting the government handle it.