Social Security-Annual Change In Retired Workers

I know it was just yesterday I did a post on Social Security. Today…the SSA released  the June updates…among other things revealing that the number of people in the Retired Worker program increased  97k to 37.4M. This is not unexpected, though there is seasonality involved (more people seem to retire in Jan-Feb) 100k per month in additions is about where we are…though the trend is headed up. Just for fun…I charted the YOY additions (which eliminates the seasonality…and it shows a very interesting picture.

We start all the way back in 1995 adding about 350k people to the SS rolls a year. It moves around between  a 200 and 400k pace before spiking right around the dotcom  bust. After that it drops back around 350k before heading steadily up to about 600k per year in June 2008. Then…it takes off like a rocket topping out in December 2009 at an over 1.2M rate before declining back to about 1M at the end of 2011. Since then, we have seen a steady increase in the rate…likely driven by the demographics of Boomer retirement.

So the question is….what will this chart look like at the end of 2015? As we chug along in 2013 with a not so terrible economy, we are adding to the program at record rates and the demographics only get worse from here. Even a mild recession could cause a huge spike in early retirement…so just as revenues are being squeezed, we would start adding huge numbers to the Social security program. Just some quick math, adding 1.2M retirees, at $1,267 per month is about $18B per year. (I know yesterday we said $60B…that’s the entire program…not just retirees, and it includes the annual COLA on the entire population.) Each retiree… assuming the same $1267 payment and 20 years on the program….will draw in $304k of payments…ignoring inflation/COLA ect…

So… lets go out on a limb, and assume that of the current population of 37.4M, the average life expectancy is 13 years. (wild ass guess…got some 62 year olds and some 95 year olds). Pencil that out, and if we eliminated SS (retirement only) tomorrow for everyone not on it….we would still be on the hook for $7.4T…roughly (still ignoring inflation).Someday I’ll add in the rest of the population. But as we know…it won’t be eliminated….and there are 60M boomers waiting in the wings.