A Social Security funding crisis could be on the horizon if policymakers fail to take action to protect the program in the next decade, threatening a 23% cut to all 70 million recipients’ annual benefits, a new report claims.
The analysis by U.S. Budget Watch 2024, a project from the public policy organization Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, predicts that if the primary trust fund used to bankroll Social Security runs out of reserves by 2033, the average newly retired dual-income couple would see an immediate reduction of $17,400. Single-income couples would lose $13,100.