Social Security Will Never Be In Actuarial Balance

Not for more than a couple of years, anyway. If there's some deal to get there, then inevitably the Social Security Trustees will, perfectly justifiably, tweak a few assumptions about future economic activity so that there will be a DOOM scenario, an EVERYTHING'S AWESOME scenario, and a "uh oh maybe in about 40 years we will have a problem" scenario. And then Fred Hiatt will print another million ZOMG WE MUST DESTROY SOCIAL SECURITY NOW IN ORDER TO SAVE IT FORTY YEARS FROM NOW columns and some future president will marvel at those worthless IOUS and blah blah blah.

We know how this works.