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5 days ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Today, we released a new Cato policy analysis, “Rethinking Social Security from a Global Perspective,” which explores Social Security’s structural problems and draws lessons from pension reform experiences in Canada, Germany, New Zealand, and Sweden. This paper provides a high-level summary of our upcoming book, Reimagining Social Security: Global Lessons for Retirement Policy Changes, to be published in August 2025. See the paper’s summary blog here.
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5 days ago | 
cato.org | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Social Security is projected to reach technical insolvency by 2033, threatening retirees with automatic 23 percent benefit cuts as the program will be unable to pay full benefits on time. The program’s looming trust-fund insolvency creates a legislative forcing mechanism and thus presents an opportunity to reimagine how Social Security could work.
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1 week ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
The Social Security Trustees released their annual report today—and the outlook is bleak. The program is barreling toward insolvency—and fast. The trust fund is projected to run dry in 2033, triggering an automatic 23 percent benefit cut—a 10 percent increase from last year’s projected 21 percent benefit cut.
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1 week ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:Deportations could add $900 billion to the debt over 10 years. Cato’s David J. Bier argues that the cost of immigration and border-related provisions in the “One Big Beautiful Bill” is likely much higher than the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) $168 billion estimate.
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2 weeks ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:Fiscal irresponsibility threatens fiscal dominance. Mercatus Center’s David Beckworth explains how fiscal policy dominated monetary policy during World War II: “From 1942 to 1951, the Fed operated under an explicit agreement with the Treasury to cap interest rates across the yield curve to support wartime financing.
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3 weeks ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:Raise the Social Security retirement age. In response to the aging population and the fiscal pressures that come with it, Denmark recently raised its retirement age to 70 for workers born in 1971 or later (those aged 54 or younger in 2025). Notably, Denmark has indexed its government pension retirement age to life expectancy since 2006—a model the United States should follow.
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1 month ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:Real spending reform is still missing from the GOP’s budget plan. The Wall Street Journal’s (WSJ) Richard Rubin quoted Boccia on the House’s reconciliation bill: “While Republicans were campaigning on reducing spending and controlling the growth in the debt, once they put pen to paper, their real priorities demonstrate that they care a lot more about cutting taxes than cutting deficits.
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1 month ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:OMB official signals impoundment is on the table. Politico’s Jennifer Scholtes and Katherine Tully-McManus report that an Office of Management and Budget (OMB) official indicated that President Trump may impound congressionally appropriated funds if lawmakers don’t enact necessary spending cuts. They write: “[Sen.
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1 month ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Here are this week’s reading links and fiscal facts:Seize the moment to rein in spending and avert fiscal disaster.
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1 month ago | 
debtdispatch.substack.com | Romina Boccia |Ivane Nachkebia
Social Security has been in the news lately—but for the wrong reasons. The Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) efforts to investigate an exaggerated fraud problem and subsequent legal battles have brought the program into the spotlight. But this coverage is missing the elephant in the room: Social Security is hurtling toward a benefit cliff—not just because of demographics, but because of a fundamentally flawed, self-defeating program design.
