December 31 2021 Fact Sheet on Social Security

Our semi-annual Fact Sheet on the Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance (OASDI) Program provides recent information on the number of beneficiaries and their average benefit amount, measures of protection provided by Social Security, and trust fund financial data. The latest Fact Sheet is shown below. To print the Fact Sheet, we recommend the PDF version.

FACT SHEET ON THE OLD-AGE, SURVIVORS, AND DISABILITY INSURANCE PROGRAM

A. Beneficiaries in Current-Payment Status, December 31, 2021

Type of benefit			Number of beneficiaries [In thousands]	Monthly rate^a [In millions]	Average monthly amount^a
Total			65,228	$99,805	^b
	Retired workers and their family members, total		50,146	80,770	^b
		Retired workers	47,293	78,413	$1,658
		Spouses	2,166	1,819	840
		Children	687	538	782
	Survivors of deceased workers, total		5,864	7,766	^b
		Children	1,976	1,933	978
		Widowed mothers and fathers with child beneficiaries in their care	114	128	1,126
		Aged widow(er)s, and aged parents	3,550	5,522	1,555
		Disabled widow(er)s	224	183	818
	Disabled workers and their family members, total		9,218	11,269	^b
		Disabled workers	7,877	10,699	1,358
		Spouses	96	36	378
		Children	1,245	533	428
^a Benefit amounts represent the monthly amount due to beneficiaries in current-payment status for December 31, 2021. These amounts exclude any adjustments to benefits for retroactive payments and certain payment withholding that may be attributable to eligibility in prior months. Therefore, these data do not represent total benefits paid from the trust funds.
^b Because the benefit amounts for workers and for the various types of family members and survivors are based on different proportions of the worker's benefit, average monthly amounts for groups of these different kinds of beneficiaries are not meaningful.

B. Selected Categories of Beneficiaries (Included Above) in
Current-Payment Status, December 31, 2021

Type of benefit		Number of beneficiaries [In thousands]	Monthly rate^a [In millions]
Disabled beneficiaries (OASDI)—Workers, disabled children aged 18 and over, and disabled widow(er)s		9,244	$11,916
Children (OASDI)		3,908	3,004
	Student children	94	84
	Disabled children aged 18 and over	1,143	1,033
	Children under age 18	2,672	1,886
Survivor children and widowed mothers and fathers		2,090	2,062
Beneficiaries aged 62 and over (OASDI)		55,503	89,321
Beneficiaries aged 65 and over (OASDI)		50,796	83,081
^a Benefit amounts represent the monthly amount due to beneficiaries in current payment status for December 31, 2021. These amounts exclude any adjustments to benefits for retroactive payments and certain payment withholding that may be attributable to eligibility in prior months. Therefore, these data do not represent total benefits paid from the trust funds.

C. Average Monthly Family Benefits in
Current-Payment Status, December 31, 2021

Selected family^a group	Number of families [In thousands]	Average family benefit^b	Average number of beneficiaries per family
Retired worker alone	44,644	$1,646	1.000
Retired worker and spouse, aged 62 and over	2,042	2,739	2.000
Disabled worker, spouse under normal retirement age, and 1 or more children	30	2,382	3.895
Widowed parent and 2 children	34	3,168	3.000
Children of deceased worker^c	1,284	1,272	1.319
Aged widow(er) alone	3,373	1,553	1.000
^a A family means beneficiaries entitled on one worker's account. ^b Benefit amounts represent the monthly amount due to beneficiaries in current payment status for December 31, 2021. These amounts exclude any adjustments to benefits for retroactive payments and certain payment withholding that may be attributable to eligibility in prior months. Therefore, these data do not represent total benefits paid from the trust funds. ^c In most cases, the family includes a widowed parent whose benefits are withheld due to earnings.

D. Measures of Protection

Coverage
We estimate that about 178 million people will work in OASDI-covered employment in 2022.
We estimate that about 94 percent of workers in paid employment and self-employment are covered under the OASDI program.

Benefit receipt among the elderly
As of December 31, 2021, we estimate that about 88 percent of the population aged 65 and over were receiving benefits.

Protection for survivors of young workers
We estimate that about 96 percent of persons aged 20-49 who worked in covered employment in 2021 have acquired survivorship protection for their children under age 18 (and surviving spouses caring for children under age 16).

Disability protection
We estimate that about 89 percent of persons aged 21-64 who worked in covered employment in 2021 can count on monthly cash benefits if they suffer a severe and prolonged disability.

E. Operations of OASI and DI Trust Funds, Combined, in 2021
[In billions]

			Calendar year	Fiscal year
Income			$1,088.3	$1,080.4
	Payroll tax contributions		980.6	972.3
	Reimbursement from General Revenue		^a	^a
	Taxation of benefits		37.6	34.8
	Interest and other income		70.1	73.3
Costs			1,144.6	1,134.8
	Total benefit payments^b		1,133.2	1,123.4
		OASI	993.1	982.7
		DI	140.1	140.7
	Railroad Retirement transfer		4.9	4.9
	Administrative expenditures		6.5	6.4
Asset reserves, end of period			2,852.0	2,853.9
^a Less than $50,000,000. ^b Benefit payments which were scheduled to be paid on January 3, 2021 were actually paid on December 31, 2020 as required by the statutory provision for early delivery of benefit payments when the normal payment delivery date is a Saturday, Sunday, or legal public holiday. The amount of these payments made on an accelerated basis was approximately $18.7 billion for the OASI Trust Fund and $6.1 billion for the DI Trust Fund. For comparability with the values for historical years, the trust fund operations and asset reserves presented here reflect the 12 months of benefits scheduled for payment each year. Note: Totals may not equal the sums of rounded components.

Social Security Program Fact Sheet