SS was never intended as a retirement plan, per se, it was more along the lines of providing very basic needs in a time when most people could own property. If your house is paid for, a SS stipend will buy a lot of beans.

"We can never insure one-hundred percent of the population against one-hundred percent of the hazards and vicissitudes of life. But we have tried to frame a law which will give some measure of protection to the average citizen and to his family against the loss of a job and against poverty-ridden old age. This law, too, represents a cornerstone in a structure which is being built, but is by no means complete.... It is...a law that will take care of human needs and at the same time provide for the United States an economic structure of vastly greater soundness." -- Franklin D. Roosevelt, August 14, 1935

To me the greater tragedy is that SS hasn't evolved with the times. The need for SS is greater than ever, not less. I don't know a single person under 50 who has EVER worked for a company with a pension plan, unless they work for the government. SS is no longer the basic safety net it was intended to be in cases where one's pension plan was lost or one became disabled. 401k's and IRAs are highly recommended, but are underutilized because many workers simply cannot afford to put much or put enough money into them.

In addition to the relative drop in income compared to inflation experienced among the poor to middle class in the last few decades, employers have also dropped benefits -- it may not show up in your paycheck, but a solid pension plan is a substantial boost to your compensation, as is a decent medical plan.

The concept of "social insurance" is based on the social aspects. The program, in order to succeed, mut be shaped by greater social principles and not by the self-interest of individual participants. While low-income families do not have access to more reliable money-making investments like mutual funds and money-market accounts, they can access the big-money investments through SS. The way the SSA combines funds to produce a steady and reliable income, it's success is requisite on a large source of funding. Privatizing part of it will rob it of the capital that it needs to make money. The old adage "it takes money to make money" is very true. And the cost of maintaining a single fund is far cheaper than the cost of maintaining millions of individual funds -- as FDR well knew; it was one of the key selling points.

Of course, stock brokers and banks want those extra expenses in managing individual portfolios, and it has nothing to do with what's good for the client.

Like all forms of insurance, the risk of loss to income is pooled among many participants. Wealthier people may lose a few dollars in interest they might have earned on another investment, but the wage cap is there to prevent excessive payments by those who have little use for it, while still being "Social Security Insurance." No one is immune from the potentially devasting loss of income. The young lawyer who expects to retire wealthy is not exempt from a car wreck and a brain injury that keep him from working -- his Auto Insurance pays for the car, but it's the pooled risk of Social Security Insurance that will keep him in beans after his trust fund has been depleted.

I'd like to see workers have the option of having MORE assets managed by the SSA in exchange for more benefits. Not only would this infuse the SSA with more cash -- and they have a remarkable history of money management behind them -- but it would also continue to provide individuals with more cash to invest the option to diversify their investments elsewhere. The financial markets are not for the faint-hearted, and many investment counselors are unscrupulous. I imagine many elderly people would feel far more comfortable investing their money with the tried and tree SSA than with a broker who may be clueless or even crooked.