United States | Third-rail thriller

America’s entitlement programmes are rapidly approaching insolvency

The politics of reforming them are already broken

Bandages are used to stick GoFundMe pages of patients who had use crowdfunding to cover medical expenses, during a rally for "Medicare for All," at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America headquarters in Washington, April 29, 2019. (Al Drago/The New York Times)Credit: New York Times / Redux / eyevineFor further information please contact eyevinetel: +44 (0) 20 8709 8709e-mail: info@eyevine.comwww.eyevine.com
But what about paying for it?Image: Eyevine
|Washington, DC

In some circles, the annual report from the Social Security and Medicare Board of Trustees is as hotly anticipated as a thriller. Admittedly, those circles are not very wide. Read the latest report, released on March 31st, and you can see why most people are happy to avoid the gruesome hobby.

This article appeared in the United States section of the print edition under the headline “Third-rail thriller”

Riding high: The lessons of America’s astonishing economy

From the April 15th 2023 edition

Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents

Explore the edition

More from United States

 Pam Bondi is sworn in as she prepares to testify during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing to examine her expected nomination to be Attorney General, at the U.S. Capitol in Washington DC.

Pam Bondi seems like a relatively safe pair of hands

But is America’s next attorney-general an independent operator?

US President Joe Biden delivers his farewell address to the nation from the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, USA.

Checks and Balance newsletter: Joe Biden’s farewell shot at the oligarchy

The outgoing president warns of a new “tech-industrial complex”


Xiaohongshu And TikTok Logos

A protest against America’s TikTok ban is mired in contradiction

Another Chinese app is not the alternative some young Americans think it is


Joe Biden wound up serving Donald Trump

In some ways, his administration will look less like an interregnum than like MAGA-lite

How bad will the smoke be for Angelenos’ health?

Expect more sickness and disrupted schooling

Should you have to prove your age before watching porn?

America’s Supreme Court weighs a Texan law aimed at protecting kids