Social Security now running a deficit; insolvency set at 2034

Social Security will spend more than it collects this year, the program’s trustees said Tuesday, marking the first time in more than 35 years that it will run an annual deficit as it slides toward insolvency by 2034.

Medicare’s main trust fund is in even worse shape, scheduled to hit insolvency in 2026 — three years earlier than last year’s estimate, the trustees said.

The twin warnings add even more pressure to a budget already strained by last year’s tax cuts and this year’s deal to boost spending on defense and basic domestic needs, leaving few bright spots in the federal fiscal picture.

The news also produced the usual finger-pointing among Democrats and Republicans, but budget watchdogs said the news was so grim that it should cut through the bipartisan bickering.

“It would be a nice change if this year Congress and the president actually took these warnings seriously enough to do something,” said Robert L. Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition.