I suppose that these scare tactics would be amusing if they were not so persistent and so untrue. Allowing for some small actuarial errors, the liabilities of the Social Security System are fully funded. The Social Security trust fund currently holds government debt sufficient to pay for pensions for the foreseeable future. It has been accumulating this debt for just this purpose since the Social Security Reforms of 1983.

Before this time Social Security was a pay as you go retirement system. Workers paid in and retirees took money out. The small surplus of payments was used to buy government debt but no one expected it to pay future retirements. By the 1970's and 1980's the system was in trouble. The retirement of the "greatest generation" was a serious drain of tax receipts and the future retirement of the dread boomers was anticipated.

Into this crisis stepped Mr Greenspan, universal financial genius. The commission that he chaired proposed that the Social Security be financed like any other pension. Payroll taxes were doubled. Part of this was used to pay for the benefits of earlier generations who had not fully funded their own pensions through payroll taxes. The rest was used to accumulate government debt that could be drawn on to pay pensions for boomers and later generations.

It may come as a surprise to some young people, but many working folks of my generation never saw the glorious Reagan tax cuts. Cuts in our income tax rates were balanced by rises in our payroll taxes. We paid our payroll taxes and it was O.K. because that would fund our retirement.

Except that the government never really seems to have gotten around to raising revenues or managing its finances. Clinton did pretty well for eight years, even achieving a surplus. Then, with the expert advice of Mr Greenspan, our current President proposed and passed new massive tax cuts. I won't even start about our mission to save Islam from itself.

Not surprisingly we are swimming in a sea of debt and conservatives are dying to find some part of that debt that they can repudiate without serious international consequences. Entitlement reform is perfect. We can cut payments and raise payroll taxes until Social Security is back on a pay as you go basis, where current pensions are a bit less than current taxes. Nobody will ever ask the government to repay the trust fund and, if payments are high enough and taxes are low enough, Social Security can contribute its healthy surplus to the greater good.