President Donald Trump's “One Big, Beautiful Bill” Will Speed Up the Timeline to Social Security Benefit Cuts, New Analysis Finds

For most aging Americans, Social Security income isn’t a luxury — it’s a necessary payout that ensures a stable financial foundation.

For 24 years, Gallup has been surveying retirees to gauge their reliance on the income they receive from Social Security. Every year, 80% to 90% of respondents have noted their payout represents a “major” or “minor” income source. In other words, it’s a necessity, in some capacity, to cover their expenses.

Ideally, elected lawmakers — which include President Donald Trump — should be doing everything in their power to ensure the long-term financial stability of Social Security. But based on the latest update from the Social Security Board of Trustees, that’s not happening.

Worse yet, President Trump’s flagship tax and spending law, the “big, beautiful bill,” is expected to speed up the timeline to across-the-board Social Security benefit cuts, according to a new analysis.

Social Security benefit cuts are an estimated eight years away

Before digging into Donald Trump’s newly passed law, the groundwork needs to be laid for what challenges await America’s leading retirement program.

Every year since the first retired-worker benefit was mailed out in 1940, the Social Security Board of Trustees has published a report that intricately details the program’s financial health. It allows anyone to see how every dollar of income is collected and to track where those dollars end up.

Arguably, the most important aspect of these annual reports is the long-term forecast. The long-term outlook takes into consideration fiscal and monetary policy changes, as well as ongoing demographic shifts, to determine how financially sound Social Security will be in the 75 years following the release of a report.

Since 1985, every Social Security Board of Trustees Report has warned of a long-term unfunded obligation. In essence, projected income in the 75 years following the release of a report is believed to be insufficient to cover outlays, which are primarily comprised of benefits but also include the administrative expenses to operate the Social Security program. As of the 2025 report, this unfunded obligation has ballooned to $25.1 trillion.

While this is a daunting figure, it’s not the most immediate cause for concern. Rather, it’s the Trustees’ projection that the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) trust fund will exhaust its asset reserves by 2033. The OASI is the fund responsible for making monthly payments to retired workers and survivors of deceased workers.

To be clear, the OASI doesn’t need a dime in its asset reserves to continue doling out payments to eligible beneficiaries. However, the depletion of its asset reserves would signal that the existing payout schedule, including near-annual cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs), is unsustainable.

According to the Trustees Report, sweeping benefit cuts of up to 23% may be necessary in eight years if the OASI’s asset reserves run dry.

The OASI’s asset reserves are forecast to be exhausted by 2033. US Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund Assets at End of Year data by YCharts.

Analysis: Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” exacerbates this cash outflow

However, this projected timeline for benefit cuts isn’t set in stone. In late July, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), the highest-ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, sent a request to the Social Security Administration’s Office of the Chief Actuary (OACT) to determine what, if any, financial impacts Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” would have on the Social Security trust funds.

On Aug. 5, the OACT offered its response and updated projections to Sen. Wyden. The headline takeaway from the OACT’s analysis is that Trump’s flagship law will speed up the timeline to across-the-board benefit cuts.

Specifically, the OACT analysis points to alterations in tax collection that are expected to adversely impact the Social Security program, beginning this year. Some of these changes include:

These provisions in the “big, beautiful bill” are meaningful because 91% of Social Security’s income is collected from the 12.4% payroll tax on earned income (wages and salary, but not investment income), with another 3.9% coming from the taxation of Social Security benefits. These aforementioned tax-reducing initiatives are forecast to increase costs for the OASI and Disability Insurance (DI) trust fund by $168.6 billion, on a combined basis, from 2025 through 2034.

This reduction in projected income collection comes at a price. The new asset reserve depletion date for the OASI has moved from the third quarter of 2033 to the fourth quarter of 2032, per the OACT. For the hypothetically combined OASI and DI (OASDI) — asset reserves from the DI can potentially be leaned on to extend the solvency of the combined OASDI — Trump’s law moves the asset reserve depletion date from the third quarter of 2034 to the first quarter of 2034.

Ongoing demographic changes are primarily to blame for Social Security’s financial struggles

Although the OACT’s analysis finds that Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” is going to worsen Social Security’s financial outlook, it’s important to recognize that the president’s newly signed law isn’t at the heart of the aforementioned $25.1 trillion (and growing) long-term funding shortfall. Social Security’s worsening financial outlook primarily rests on an assortment of ongoing demographic shifts.

Some of these demographic changes are well-known and have been ongoing for some time. For example, baby boomers retiring from the workforce are weighing down the worker-to-beneficiary ratio.

We’ve also witnessed the average life expectancy notably increase since the first retired-worker benefit check was mailed in January 1940. The Social Security program was never designed to pay retirees for multiple decades.

But a number of these major demographic shifts are occurring below the surface:

While not a demographic shift, elected lawmakers’ lack of progress in fixing Social Security is deserving of some blame, as well. Though proposals to strengthen Social Security are aplenty on Capitol Hill, finding some semblance of middle ground between America’s two major political parties has proved virtually impossible.

Even though Donald Trump’s tax and spending law is forecast to make things worse for Social Security over the next decade, it’s far from the root issues that need to be addressed to strengthen America’s leading retirement program.