Deinonychus antirrhopus

Social Security Trustees Report

Basically I'm with Victor on this one. There just isn't much new here. The basic conclusion is pretty much the same (a one year shift in either direction is not a big deal despite what either the Republicans or Democrats say). Victor notes that the ultimate assumptions between 2004 are virtually identical to the new ones for 2005.

What is fascinating is that Kevin Drum is in some sort of bipolar mode. First he suggests there is some sort of monkey business in the 2005 report. Later he recants this position based on an e-mail and Max Sawicky's comments. But a bit about an hour later (and prior to his recanting) Drum decides that the report is actually good news and apparently the monkey business is either good, not there, or while bad was done incompetently.

Later today Kevin citing Matthew Yglesias continues with the new meme that Social Security is not in crisis. See, we shouldn't have private accounts because not only is Social Security not in crisis because the economy is going to grow enough to keep Social Security solvent. But private accounts are bad because the economy is not going to grow enough to make the private accounts viable. If you are thinking this is one of the "free money" scenarios you aren't alone.