New figures show that the Social Security trust fund’s annual surplus was all but exhausted in 2009 as the recession steered hundreds of thousands of workers to retirement or claiming disability. The Congressional Budget Office had projected some time ago that it would operate in the red during 2010 and 2011, but the steeper economic downslide suggests that losses will be even greater than anticipated.

“Things are a little bit worse than had been expected,” said Social Security Administration Chief Actuary Stephen Goss. “Clearly, we’re going to be negative for a year or two.”

A look at some of the specific numbers makes clear the gravity of the deficit. In 2009, more than 2.7 million joined the giant retirement program, which was nearly half a million more than those who had enrolled in 2008. And 2008 had been considered a “busy” year of growth for the program before the 2009 figures were released. This brought the total number to more than 52 million, or one in every six Americans, who received Social Security benefits in 2009.

In 2008, Social Security received $63 billion more in taxes than it paid out in benefits. Last year, it collected only $3 billion more than it spent. The massive slide is attributed to both the spike in retired workers collecting benefits or disability, and an end of growth in payroll tax revenue, which before 2009 had been keeping pace with 4.5 percent average annual wage increases.

Sixty-five years ago, there were 40 workers paying into the Social Security program for every beneficiary that drew from it. That figure has fallen sharply to just over three workers to support each recipient.

The exodus of citizens from the workforce has hastened the day of reckoning when baby boomers spend through the money allocated for their retirement. Columnist Jay Ambrose called the alarming 2009 data a “forerunner of what we will have—big time—starting in 2016, a harbinger of what could be the single most threatening domestic issue we face as a people ….”

Some of these baby boomers who planned to remain in the workforce for a few more years are now forced to either struggle through a period of no income generation as they job hunt, or to retire ahead of their original plans despite reduced compensation. A system putting food on the table for those who leave the workforce while bringing hardship on those who seek employment is one in need of drastic reform. But after the beating the Obama administration has suffered over the health-care reform issue, it is unlikely to tinker with this “third rail” of politics. And the longer Washington waits, the more the program deteriorates and the more expensive any future repair becomes.

“Congress fiddles while the budget burns,” said Ron Gebhardtsbauer head of Pennsylvania State University’s actuarial science program.

A February 16 study by The Senior Citizens League (tscl) reports that a majority of retirees are already feeling the squeeze under the collapsing program. Social Security beneficiaries did not receive an annual Cost of Living Adjustment in 2010 for the first time since the automatic adjustment was introduced in 1975. Fifty-one percent of seniors reported receiving a smaller check this year than in 2009, with some of the decreases being as high as $70 per month.

Since Social Security was adjusted in 1984 to collect more money in payroll taxes than it paid out, the program accumulated a $2.5 trillion trust fund. But those surplus dollars were diverted into other programs, and are now long gone. The collapse could not have come at a worse time for Washington. Not only has Social Security’s lending pool evaporated, but the program has deteriorated into a vicious drain.

So, for the first time in 25 years, Social Security is on the brink. And analysts forecast that the situation is still far from the nadir of its descent. The diseased system may seem like a recent phenomenon, but the collapse has been long in the making. Politicians have been borrowing from the surplus fund for decades, and using creative bookkeeping to avoid registering the deficits into our fiscal imbalances. The foundation of this severe deficit crisis was dug by years of spending reserve funds that were already spoken for.

The politicians’ myopic approach to spending surplus Social Security dollars has been raising red flags for years for those willing to look at the situation realistically. For decades, the founder of the Trumpet’s predecessor, the Plain Truth, warned that Bible prophecies pointed to a massive crisis in America’s economy which would thrust the international economy into chaos. The crumbling Social Security system is only the latest evidence proving that the crisis is already well underway. America’s economic system is broken beyond repair.

But sure Bible prophecies forecast a spectacular future beyond this crisis that will be a time of financial abundance for all nations, responsible government, fair business practices, healthy industries—and no taxes. For more about the extreme prosperity and fulfillment that this new system will bring about, read The Wonderful World Tomorrow—What It Will Be Like.