i.e., the liability for SS doesn’t mean they actually spent the money

Oh, OK, they don’t have to sell t-bills to fund my retirement SS checks, at least not yet, and they could always legislate those “entitlements” away anyway..

Doesn’t the Federal government take on additional debt to cover the all of the deficit

They sell debt on the market. Some people seem to think that just because there’s a shortfall (which isn’t even based on cash expenditures – i.e., the liability for SS doesn’t mean they actually spent the money) that debt automagically appears.

You touched on this before, but did not wish to elaborate. Doesn’t the Federal government take on additional debt to cover the all of the deficit, the difference between what they get via taxes and seizures and what they spend? Auction off T-bills and other such thingys?

The White House and the Congressional Budget Office oppose the change, arguing that the programs are not true liabilities because government can cancel or cut them.

I really have nothing to add to that.

Until inflation becomes so bad the .gov has to stop printing money. But by then we all are way past screwed. What I don’t understand is that some people are willy nilly over Global Warming but don’t understand that a real Sword of Damocles is hanging over our heads. It is called Medicare/Social Insecurity.

I worry about being old and not being able to have both medicine and air conditioning. Ironically Medicare may be the balloon note that bankrupts the World. But Al Gore will find a solution. He always does. There must be a way we can tax ourselves out of this mess. /extreme sarcasm>