The news yesterday (WaPo) that the Social Security Administration (SSA) is in total crisis, did not come as a complete shock. But aspects of the current crisis did deliver Richter-scale angst.
For reference, this agency delivers $1.5 trillion a year in earned benefits to 73 million retired workers, their survivors, and poor and disabled Americans. Social Security is also the primary source of income for about 40 percent of older Americans.
Recall much of the SSA was already eliminated as part of the DOGE cost-cutting efforts led by Elon Musk, further undermining the already struggling organization’s ability to provide reliable and quick service to vulnerable customers. The moves by DOGE have upended an agency that, despite the popularity of its programs, has been underfunded for years, and now faces potential insolvency in a decade
However, I had no remote conception of the sheer dimensions of the crisis, which - if allowed to continue unabated, could precipitate its collapse. And also a major societal and socioeconomic calamity.
What was I unaware of? Let me list the major "angst" elements:
- Wait times for callers at the 800 number (800-772-1213, to create an account) have now reached 120 minutes. ( Some callers report being on hold for four or five hours.)
- AARP announced Monday that more than 2,000 people a week have called the retiree organization since early February — double the usual number.
- Immeasurable pain and burdens are now being imposed on millions of recipients disabled or in failing health. This is given direct-deposit transactions and identity authentication, operations that affect almost everyone receiving benefits, will no longer be able to be done by phone.
- Customers with computers will go through the process online; those without will have to wait in line at their local field office. (26 of which have already been shuttered nationally).
- Trump disparagement of SSA employees has so destroyed SSA morale that many no longer give their all to the job. Also, they now come to work in t-shirts and jeans instead of business suits.
The backdoor gutting by Musk's DOGE renegades is cowardly but they know a front door assault is futile, as Gee Dumbya Bush learned in 2005. Then the big boner was to privatize the whole system. ("Shrub" insisted he was intent on using his "political capital" from winning the 2004 election.)
Under Bush's plan, once personal security accounts (PSAs) were established and tied to the stock market, those who opted out were eligible for "the base pension". This would be the maximum monthly allotment one can receive in the absence of any other investment, i.e. in mutual funds or index funds. The amount in 2005 -06 was estimated at $410/month. Figuring in inflation that might be $650/month now. Terrific if you are a senior and ok with cat food and kibbles.
So no, Musk and his DOGE Bros aren't going that route now, they are in the midst of hollowing out Social Security to the point it collapses and "the only option left is privatization". Why do you think Trump appointed a veteran Wall Streeter (Frank Bisignano) e.g.
to take over the agency? Out of fondness for seniors and ensuring their financial security?
And is now in the process of being confirmed - as he dodges one question after another - like he did yesterday.
Social Security was already struggling to serve the public amid an explosion of retiring baby boomers. But now Social Security has been damaged even further by the rapid cuts and chaos of Trump’s first two months in office. Many current and former officials fear that the push is part of a long-sought effort by conservatives to privatize all or part of the agency.
It's self-evident that Musk's cutting (via DOGE) of SSA offices and staff is easily the most reckless and vicious carnage of federal agency. This is because it not only torpedoes the employment of thousands - but also affects the lives of tens of millions of seniors who depend on it for their very survival.
Unless Americans take to the streets in their MILLIONS the destitution of millions may be what we have to look forward to – once the program lays in ruins. And for reference, given 2 of 5 have Social Security as their sole source of income we may be looking at a societal calamity under any privatization. Think 10 million unable to live on any 'base pension' and now homeless, living in cardboard boxes or begging for charity. That was the case prior to 1935 and could be the future if we let the Muskrat prevail.
See Also:
Social Security nominee falsely claims no DOGE contacts, Democratic senator says
Comparing any political system to Hitler’s Nazi regime is a tricky business and often overstated. One shouldn’t diminish the horrors of the Holocaust or overstate current political conditions. Nevertheless, the lessons gleaned from the Nazi’s Gleichschaltung project are worthy of consideration.
Gleichschaltung is the German word for bringing society into line with a specific political agenda. In the two-+ months since taking the White House, Donald Trump and his wingman Elon Musk’s moves are eerily reminiscent of Hitler’s Gleichschaltung, the process of serving Hitler’s goals by consolidating power and enforcing uniformity across all sectors of society. Trump and Musk are moving quickly to dismantle the federal government and bring whatever’s left of the public sector into alignment with their agenda.
According to the Holocaust Encyclopedia, “Once Hitler became chancellor, he and the Nazi Party sought to ‘coordinate’ all political, social, and cultural institutions with the Nazi state.” Think: Project 2025. “The ‘coordination’ was done in the name of national unity.” Think MAGA. “Everything was subject to coordination: local government, professional organizations, social clubs, leisure activities – even those for children.”
by Sam Pizzigati | March 26, 2025 - 5:12am | permalink
Why is Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, hyperventilating about Social Security? Why is he inventing unhinged tales about “fraudulent” hordes of Social Security grifters? Why is his “DOGE” chopping away staffers at the already understaffed Social Security Administration?
Let’s start with the political reality that most Americans see Social Security as absolutely essential to their future financial security. These average Americans, Musk and his like-minded super wealthy fear, are eventually going to start demanding that America’s rich pay a far bigger share of the revenue Social Security so desperately needs.
What are these rich paying now into Social Security? Peanuts.
Social Security’s basic math: Employees currently pay 6.2 percent of the money they make into the Social Security system. Their employers match that 6.2 percent. Self-employed Americans, for their part, pay 12.4 percent.
And:Social Security
by Robert Reich | March 26, 2025 - 5:20am | permalink— from Robert Reich's Substack
Friends,
Financial services executive Frank Bisignano, Trump’s pick to become permanent commissioner of Social Security, faced lawmakers this morning in a Senate confirmation hearing. He “guaranteed” senators that he would not seek to privatize the program.
Yet almost every lawmaker on Capitol Hill knows that Social Security — the federal agency that delivers $1.5 trillion a year in earned benefits to 73 million retired workers, or 1 in 5 people in the United States, each month, along with their survivors, and poor and disabled Americans — is now engulfed in the worst crisis of its history.
Why the crisis?
Not because it’s running out of money. As I’ve said, just raise the cap slightly on income subject to Social Security taxes and it’s in good shape forever. Trump and Republicans want to stop taxing Social Security benefits — a tax now paid by higher-income retirees — but doing so would further deplete funds from which the program’s benefits are paid.
Not because of fraud, as Musk keeps alleging. He’s dead wrong. Social Security has a payment accuracy rate of 99.7 percent. None of Musk’s businesses comes close to matching that degree of accuracy.
And not because of high administrative costs. Its administrative costs are only 0.5 percent, the lowest by far of any large program in the public or private sector.
The crisis is entirely due to Trump and Musk....
Trump swore he would never touch Social Security. But by handing the axe to Musk — who deceptively calls the program a “Ponzi scheme” and is moving at breakneck speed to gut it — Trump could be responsible for killing it.
Trump and Musk are:
Lying about Social Security, including false claims of massive fraud — providing a pretext for actions that could undermine eligible beneficiaries’ access to benefits.
Engaging in deep cuts to staffing, new restrictions on phone-based services for the public, and “agency-wide … restructuring” and “massive reorganizations” of SSA that are neither well thought-out nor wise — all of which threaten SSA’s ability to serve seniors and people with disabilities effectively while providing a potential excuse for privatizing key services.
Jeopardizing the reliability of SSA’s systems by sharply reducing staff with technical expertise of systems. After years of underfunding, the Social Security Administration needs more staff — not fewer — to give the nation’s retirees and people with disabilities the service they deserve.
Liberal economists Paul Krugman and Robert Reich are warning that between tariffs, mass deportations and mass layoffs of federal government workers, President Donald Trump may be laying the groundwork for a long and painful recession. Conservative and libertarian economists are worried as well: the late Milton Friedman, a major influence on today's right-wing economists, was a vehement critic of tariffs — which he viewed as terrible for both consumers and businesses.
Friedman famously said, "We call a tariff a protective measure. It does protect. It protects the consumer very well against one thing: It protects the consumer against low prices."
In an article published by the conservative website The Bulwark on March 24, journalist Jill Lawrence describes some of the economic pain that Trump's policies may inflict in the months to come — including much higher prices if his tariffs really get going on Wednesday, April 2 as promised (Trump has delayed his 25 percent tariffs on Canada and Mexico more than once) in "Cruelty and Indecision: Trump’s Recipe for Economic Chaos."
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