Fun and Games in Scaring People About Social Security

As we all know, one of the major recreational sports of media outlets is finding new and innovative ways to scare people about Social Security. One of my favorites is "infinite horizon accounting." This is when you project out Social Security spending and revenue into the infinite future and then calculate the difference. It gives you a REALLY BIG NUMBER.

We got an example of the casual use of this infinite horizon accounting in a column by Wharton Business School Professor Olivia Mitchell. T...