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Last time we reviewed the most overlooked insurance and the limits and limitations of government benefits.  

Now let me ask the question: What would you do?

How long would you be able to keep a roof over your head, the lights on and food on the table, if a disability kept you off the job?

In Rebar to Cement Your Financial Foundation, the following table showed your future potential earning power until age 65 at various ages and income levels.  It’s a lot of power!

In personal finance insurance is perhaps the most difficult subject to address because it forces us to think about the unknown.  In particular, our own mortality and sense of invincibility.  Bad things happen to other people—not me. 

Further, because insurance is about protecting against a future unknown, it’s difficult to determine or calculate how much protection you and your family will actually need.  Then there’s the issue of estimating how long will you need the protection. What is known is that you will pay premiums month after month and year after year. What is unknown and uncertain is whether the event you’re insuring against will ever occur.

In Part 1 of Why Are Social Security Investment Returns So Low?, we looked at how insurance companies work and why they are inherently conservative.  Let’s continue by examining Social Security and its investment returns.

Now about those Social Security Investment Returns

In the previous blog Social Security: What is it? Insurance or Investment?, we determined that Social Security from its beginning was and is an insurance program that blends the personal needs of each participant with the collective needs of society.

Given that it operates like private insurance, the logical question is: “How does an insurance company work?”

In this two part blog, we will first answer that question.  In part two, we will look at Social Security investment returns.