Kent Conrad: “Yes. I knew we were going to get into this debate at some point so I asked my staff to see if we could put together some…”

“Yes. I knew we were going to get into this debate at some point so I asked my staff to see if we could put together some charts and try to explain what is happening. It is the part of this discussion that has received almost no attention, and the Senator is exactly right. Here is what is happening. We have a dramatic increase in people eligible for Social Security. This chart shows the number of Social Security beneficiaries exploding with retirement of the baby boom generation. This is the increase in people eligible. We will see in short order a doubling of the people eligible for Social Security. The President told us repeatedly: None of the Social Security surplus will be used to fund other spending initiatives or tax relief. He broke that promise. He said: Every dollar of Social Security and Medicare tax revenue will be reserved for Social Security and Medicare. He broke that promise. Then he said: We're going to keep the promise of Social Security and keep the government from raiding the Social Security surplus. He said that in a radio address in March of 2001. Then he said in 2002: None of the Social Security surplus will be used to fund other spending initiatives or tax relief. I went back and I said, let's add up how much money the President in his budget is taking from the Social Security trust fund. He is borrowing $2.4 trillion. Compare that to the income tax cuts of the same period, $2.5 trillion. Amazing how close these things are.…”