[higher]

All social security revenue that is not paid out in benefits is replaced with unmarketable treasury securities and spent as part of the general fund. When social security ceases to run a nominal surplus, the money to pay for those securities will come out of the general fund. As you can see, social security is essentially part of the broader budget, and the divide between its budget and the broader budget is strictly imaginary.

As such I think it is appropriate to calculate FICA spending exactly as the author has.

[higher]

I see I have been rated down for posting the truth. If you would like to read about the truth, you can find it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Security_(United_States)

"Congress invested these surpluses into special series, non-marketable U.S. Treasury securities held by the Social Security Trust Fund. Under the law, the government bonds held by Social Security are backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government."

"According to most projections, the Social Security trust fund will begin drawing on its Treasury Notes toward the end of the next decade (around 2018 or 2019), at which time the repayment of these notes will have to be financed from the general fund."

[anigbrowl]

I think the downvote is due a lack of understanding rather than disagreement. What is perhaps not obvious is that payments towards 'social security' in excess of the $106k cap is (or ought to be) allocated towards the payment of interest on those outstanding bonds, hence the apparent linear increase.

But also, your references to 'the truth' unintentionally gives you the air of a conspiracy theorist.

Incidentally, it's noting that the solvency projections are not inevitable but are based on the assumption of steady demographic change. It will be interesting to review these when the 2010 Census data becomes available in December or early 2011.

[jbooth]

US Treasury securities back lots of things, like the majority of the securities market and China. I think they're a pretty safe investment if you're running a surplus and want to stash the money for later payouts.

The "social security money is being taken by the gov't" meme is just so silly - what should they do, put the money in cash in a big vault somewhere?

[2arrs2ells]

No, you've been rated down for a reply that does not actually address the comment the parent poster made.

Your comment on Social Security accounting (which is correct, as far as I know), has no bearing on the parent's observation that FICA tax doesn't scale linearly - because it is capped at a certain point.

[higher]

The essential nature of Social Security accounting is such that FICA tax is unrelated to FICA spending. At the moment, much of your FICA tax is spent on general fund items. In the future, much of your income tax will be spent on FICA items.

[2arrs2ells]

Thanks for explaining!

[Semiapies]

These numbers are based on expenditures; to cap off the FICA portion of the receipt despite actual spending would be misleading.