The CBO Doesn’t Like Government

“Social Security is fully funded for the next 40 years. It’s not in crisis…This is something that is perpetuated by people who don’t like government”, Harry Reid told David Gregory a couple of weeks ago:

Well, if you can believe it, the CBO is saying today, that Social Security will begin running permanent deficits this year, not 2016.

The Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday that Social Security will pay out $45 billion more in benefits this year than it will collect in payroll taxes, further straining the nation’s finances. The deficits will continue until the Social Security trust funds are eventually drained, in about 2037.

Previously, CBO said Social Security would start running permanent deficits in 2016. In the short term, Social Security is suffering from a weak economy that has payroll taxes lagging and applications for benefits rising. In the long term, Social Security will be strained by the growing number of baby boomers retiring and applying for benefits.

Maybe what Reid meant to say was that Social Security was fully funded for the next 40 days.

Ed Morrissey continues:

This isn’t the only horrible news in the report by a longshot, either. CBO’s projected deficit for this year is a cool $1.5 trillion or 9.8 percent of GDP, which is just two-tenths of one percent less than last year’s all-time budget-buster. And there’s not much revenue relief coming from new jobs: CBO expects that unemployment will remain above eight percent through 2012 and won’t get back to a historic norm of 5-6 percent or so until 2016. This ship has already started to sink, in other words, and yet Captain Hope chose to use his annual megaphone last night to talk about stuff like high-speed rail

See also Gateway Pundit, who reminds us: In 2006 Dems Cheered When They Blocked Social Security Reform – Now It’s Running in the Red