Social Security Addendum: Stephen Green brings up a point that I ignored in my recent post on Social Security. Whenever the debate on Social Security turns to the fact that the "trust fund" financing the future of the program is full of nothing but IOUs from the Treasury, the folks who use phrases like "lock box" in their arguments say things like this:

To say the funds are not real is to say the benefits can be withheld because taxes that have been paid are not "there." This is absurd. In titles to wealth, there is never any "there." There are relationships regulated by law. You buy a share of IBM, the law says you own a piece of IBM. The law says that taxes in excess of expenses in Social Security, plus accrued interest, have been loaned to the Federal government.

The short version of that argument is, "Social Security will get paid for. After all, the government isn't going to default on those IOUs." Yes. That's exactly my fear.