Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance

In the United States, Social Security is the commonly used term for the federal Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) program and is administered by the Social Security Administration (SSA). The original Social Security Act was enacted in 1935, and the current version of the Act, as amended, encompasses several social welfare and social insurance programs. The average monthly Social Security benefit for November 2022 was $1,551. The total cost of the Social Security program for the year 2021 was $1.145 trillion or about 5 percent of U.S. GDP. Social Security is funded primarily through payroll taxes called Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) or Self Employed Contributions Act (SECA). Wage and salary earnings in covered employment, up to an amount specifically determined by law (see tax rate table below), are subject to the Social Security payroll tax. Wage and salary earnings above this amount are not taxed. In 2022, the maximum amount of taxable earnings is $147,000. Social Security is nearly universal, with 94 percent of individuals in paid employment in the United States working in covered employment. However, about 6.6 million state and local government workers in the United States, or 28 percent of all state and local workers, are not covered by Social Security but rather pension plans operated at the state or local level.