Social Security Payroll Tax

Steve Robinson briefed members of Congress and congressional staff members on Social Security payroll tax cuts, also known as FICA tax cuts. Two weeks earlier, a bill sponsored by Senator Patrick Moynihan authorizing reductions in the Social Security payroll tax was defeated in the Senate. Mr. Robinson explained the debate on the Social Security tax cuts as being between those who want to save the huge amount of money growing in the Social Security trust fund to go toward paying pensions in the next century, although Congress is already borrowing it, and those who advocate a tax cut in order to give some of the money back to the taxpayers since Congress is spending it anyway. He explained the process by which the Social Security tax is collected and maintained, and advocated changes in the Social Security system on the grounds that the continuing surplus in the Social Security “trust fund” may be an accounting conjecture rather than an established fact. close