Costs of Merging Social Security Retirement and Disability Funds
The urgent financing crisis facing Social Security Disability Insurance (DI) is giving rise to suggestions that the DI Trust Fund be merged with Social Security’s larger Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) Trust Fund. These two components of Social Security have been kept separate thus far since their inceptions. Of the two, DI currently faces the much more immediate (2016) threat of depletion. Combining the two funds would allow disability benefits to be paid from payroll taxes currently earmarked for Social Security retirement benefits. The following factors should be borne in mind if any such policy change is considered. Read more…