Here’s an issue not being discussed much in this year’s campaign: The winners of U.S. Senate races across the country likely will face a Social Security crisis near the end of their terms, about the time they would run for re-election.

 In Arkansas, that would be Sen. Tom Cotton or one of the candidates seeking to replace him.

Both the Social Security Administration’s actuaries and the Congressional Budget Office have said that the Old-Age & Survivors Insurance Trust Fund, which pays seniors’ Social Security benefits, will become insolvent by the end of 2032.

That’s less than seven years from now.

Mark Sanger discussed the problem in a Feb. 25 webinar. He is a 30-year Social Security Administration veteran who now serves as the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget’s director of Social Security policy. 

The CRFB is a nonpartisan group that tries (in vain) to convince lawmakers to balance the federal budget.

Social Security is funded by workers’ payroll taxes that are deposited into its two trust funds, the aforementioned Old-Age & Survivors Insurance Trust Fund and the Disability Insurance Trust Fund. The program collected more in revenues than it paid in benefits until around 2010. Since then, the reverse has been true, and there’s no end in sight. 

The problem is happening in large part because there are not enough working people to pay for all of the beneficiaries.

Americans are living longer and having fewer children who grow up to become taxpayers. In 1940, average life expectancy was 64. Now it’s 79. Meanwhile, we’ve gone from a peak of 3.7 children per American woman in 1957 to 1.6 in 2024. 

As a result, the ratio of workers to recipients has fallen from 16:1 in 1950 to 3:1 in 2009. That number is expected to fall to 2.5 workers per beneficiary by 2028.

When there were enough workers, Social Security used the surpluses to invest in U.S. government bonds that finance other government operations and the U.S. national debt. These are the same bonds purchased by other investors, foreign and domestic. Between the principal collected through payroll taxes and the interest, Social Security’s two trust funds have accumulated $2.5 trillion.

Unfortunately, the Old-Age & Survivors Insurance Trust Fund will burn through all that money by the end of 2032. By then, the payroll taxes it collects will cover only 76% of the costs.

Under current law, beneficiaries would see an immediate 24% cut in their Social Security benefits, or an average of $18,400 a year for a married couple. More than 40% of seniors rely on Social Security for the majority of their income.

To prevent that from happening, Congress could do what it usually does now. That would be waiting until there’s a crisis and then taking the “easy” way out by transferring money from the rest of the budget to Social Security.

Such an action would worsen the nation’s long-term budget situation. It also would change Social Security’s fundamental nature, Sanger noted. Instead of it being a defined benefit financed by trust funds, it would become another government program.

Next president can’t ignore Social Security

The winner of this year’s U.S. Senate race in Arkansas would be on the ballot then, if he or she chooses to run. The same would be true of whoever wins the presidential race in 2028.

There are alternatives, none of which solve the problem by themselves. One would be limiting wealthy recipients’ benefits and cost of living adjustments. Another would be raising the age people qualify for Social Security benefits if they are still physically able to work.

Workers currently pay Social Security taxes on only the first $184,500 in income. Doing away with that cap by itself would push the year of insolvency to 2055, according to the CRFB. But it would mean rich people would pay much higher taxes, which they tend to successfully resist.

Sanger said the sooner we act, the less painful the solutions would be because policymakers could phase them in.

Unfortunately, “sooner” was decades ago. We’re fast approaching “later.” 

We’ll reach the deadline somewhere around the election in 2032. At that point, no candidate will be able to avoid discussing it.

Maybe they should be talking about it before this year’s election, too.By Steve Brawner, © 2026

By Steve Brawner Communications, Inc. Steve Brawner’s column is syndicated to 21 outlets in Arkansas. Email him at brawnersteve@mac.com.

 

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