We are talking about the two main risks of Social Security today. #1 is the risk of taking your social security too early and #2 is that your social security will be taxable.
In fact today we’re only going to focus on one of the risks that it faces you regarding your Social Security. Next week’s show will be a follow up show to address risk #2
It is very important to understand the history of Social Security.
Social Security was brought about in 1935 by President Roosevelt as part of the New Deal with America, at this time, it was a insurance against living too long. At that time, the average life expectancy was only age 62. And you could not start taking benefits until age 65. Also, at this time, we had 42 people working for every one person receiving benefits.
But if you fast forward to 2020, we see that what we’ve ended up with is a very expensive retirement program and instead of having 42 people working, now it’s down to only having three people work for every one person receiving benefits and over the next 10 years, that number is going to drop from three down to two people working for every one person receiving benefits.