What's wrong with Social Security

From the US Government site:

Monthly Benefits

In 1950 all Social Security beneficiaries received a general "cost-of-living" increase--for the first time since benefits began in 1940. Ida May Fuller is seen here receiving her first increased benefit check on October 3, 1950.

Payment of monthly Social Security benefits began in January 1940, and were authorized not only for aged retired workers but for their aged wives or widows, children under age 18, and surviving aged parents. On January 31, 1940, the first monthly retirement check was issued to Ida May Fuller of Ludlow, Vermont, in the amount of $22.54. Miss Fuller, a Legal Secretary, retired in November 1939. She started collecting benefits in January 1940 at age 65 and lived to be 100 years old, dying in 1975. (Examining the first batch of checks) Ida May Fuller worked for three years under the Social Security program. The accumulated taxes on her salary during those three years was a total of $24.75. Her initial monthly check was $22.54. During her lifetime she collected a total of $22,888.92 in Social Security benefits.

I guess there is such thing as a free lunch....for a while.