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There may be some Ponzi aspects to US Federal budget, but that isn't it.

How is transferring money from workers to non-workers is reminiscent of a Ponzi sceme in any way? There's no imaginary wealth being created, it's just a transfer of wealth from younger to older generation. I wouldn't bet that future young will be as silent about it as we are, but I wouldn't completely discard it as a "Ponzi scheme" either.

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I've led us off on a tangent, so I'll be brief and I won't respond after this.

There is no guarantee that there will be enough workers in the next generation to cover the workers who are paying today. Without new recruits, the system fails to meet it's promises.

However, while the system may end up paying out less than it promised at some point, it will not collapse completely.

Many people consider their Social Security payments to be promises to them, in exchange for paying the Social Security tax. The difference between Social Security and a Ponize schema is you can stop putting money into a Ponzie scheme if you believe that you won't be getting the money back. If people had the option to stop paying in to Social Security then it would have collapsed a long time ago.

Many people are wrong ;( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flemming_v._Nestor

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