Social Security is not a pension plan where you pay in while young and collect when you reach a certain age. It is funded each year by taxes that workers pay to finance the expenditures due to current Social Security recipients. Since taxes in any year do not exactly equal the amounts needed for Social Security payments at that time, there is a buffer called the Social Security Trust Fund between the taxes and payments. This trust fund was built up in the last few decades to prepare for the enormous number of Baby Boomers born after the Second World War who would be collecting benefits. Baby
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