Comment by afavour

I believe he's referring to the fact that social security, despite being billed as essentially a "retirement account" type program where e.g. silent gen paid in and got out roughly the same amount, it functions more like a ponzi scheme.

This is a consequence of the fact that, when the program was instituted, Roosevelt wanted to immediately start paying out to some people. So, boomers (very large generation) paid for their parents (relatively much smaller generation, meaning small per-person bill).

Now millennials and zoomers (relatively smaller generations) are expected to pay for boomers (much larger per-person bill). Between that, the incredible spending of medicare, and the federal propping-up of the housing market, a huge proportion of the economy has been dedicated to wealth transfer to the olds, an unproductive class who will be gone soon anyhow.

... thhat is not what I'm saying. Im describing the system by which social security bizarrely says a different person owes you because you paid someone else, most of which will be dead by the time you 'draw' it 'back'.