Does the Withdrawal Rule Decide It?

A 4% withdrawal rule under-spends a portfolio and leaves a large balance. Social Security spends everything and leaves nothing. Comparing the two on total present value therefore invites a fair criticism: you have compared consumption against consumption-plus-savings.

The model answers this directly, because it can force both systems onto the same terms. All figures below are from the August 2026 build.

Test A — "Match Social Security": pay the identical income, then look at what's left

Each cell is forced to pay exactly Social Security's own monthly income, with the leftover balance shown at death:

With income held exactly constant, the bequest is the pure efficiency gain — no hoarding artifact is possible. In the model, the glidepath paid every dollar Social Security paid and left an eight-figure estate.

A bond portfolio could not even replicate Social Security. Forced to pay Social Security's own income stream, it ran dry before the end of a long retirement at every income level tested. That is the most damning single fact in the fixed-income data — and it cuts against the DC case, not for it.

Test B — "Amortize to zero": spend it all, exactly like Social Security

Here both sides leave nothing, and the portfolio is drawn to exactly $0 — a true apples-to-apples income comparison:

With no bequest on either side, the glidepath paid three to seven times Social Security's monthly income in the model. Bonds paid less than Social Security.

The verdict does not depend on the withdrawal rule

Hold income constant, and the glidepath won on wealth (Test A). Hold wealth constant at zero, and it won on income (Test B). The objection is closed from both directions in the July 2026 model — and the fixed-income verdict (Social Security wins) is unchanged in both directions too.

For the cash-flow caveat — cases where a plan wins on lifetime value but could deliver a low monthly income in a bad market — see What Moves the Answer and the population-weighted "yellow flag" analysis.

About these figures — please read. Every number here is an output of the Is Social Security Worth It? simulator, read from the August 2026 build. These are model estimates, not predictions, advice, or guarantees, describing the model on that date, not a promise about future versions. See Corrections & Retractions; figures may change in later builds. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Your actual benefit is set by the SSA at ssa.gov/myaccount. Per-cell data: DCvsSSv3withdrawal.csv.