To be very clear - Social Security for the next 10 years can pay all benefits in full, for the next 25 years it's 97% funded. For the next 50 years it's 88% funded. There is a shortfall, but that is not 'going broke,' and that is not 'unaffordable.' This is a question of choice, and values.

Pension expert Nancy Altman explains why bipartisan claims that Social Security is going broke just don't add up, how the decades-forward-thinking design of the system accommodates changes in demographics (but is being tested by middle class wage stagnation and the high cost of healthcare,) and warns that the greatest threat facing social security is a financial sector that wants access to its money.

Nancy is author of Social Security Works! Why Social Security Isn’t Going Broke and How Expanding It Will Help Us All from the New Press.