Changes

==United States==

==United States==

Social Security was founded as a quick-fix solution to [[unemployment]] by paying off older workers to give up their jobs for younger workers. No net new jobs were created. Economists call this a zero-sum game, where net gains and losses are exactly balanced.  The payment system mimicks the idea of insurance premiums with payments withheld from a workers paycheck. None of the premiums, however, have ever been invested in a so-called "Trust fund," and are actually  diverted into a "pay as you go" (or "paygo") system destined for immediate [[aggregate consumption]]. Hence many of the structural flaws date from the programs' origins.

Social Security was founded as a quick-fix solution to [[unemployment]] by paying off older workers to give up their jobs for younger workers. No net new jobs were created. Economists call this a zero-sum game, where net gains and losses are exactly balanced.  The payment system mimicks the idea of insurance premiums with payments withheld from a workers paycheck. None of the premiums, however, have ever been invested in a so-called "Trust fund," and are actually  diverted into a "[[pay as you go]]" (or "paygo") system destined for immediate aggregate [[consumption expenditure]]s. Hence many of the structural flaws date from the programs' origins.

Payments are based on a percentage of earnings of workers which become an obligation, or [[debt]], of the United States government.

Payments are based on a percentage of earnings of workers which become an obligation, or [[debt]], of the United States government.