Mercatus Center Senior Research Fellow Veronique de Rugy uses Long-Term Projections for Social Security to examine the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO’s) 2008, 2009, and 2010 projections for the year-end balance of Social Security accounts. These balances are presented as percentages of taxable payroll, a weighted average of taxable wages and taxable self-employment income which provides an estimate of the earnings subject to payroll taxation each year. In both 2009 and 2010 CBO’s progressions became more and more bleak, increasing amount of expected deficits each year.

Veronique de Rugy discusses the accounting behind Social Security at National Review Online's The Corner.