On Friday, senior officials in the Obama adminstration signalled that Social Secruity reform would probably not be part of a comprehensive plan to reduce the federal budget.  In other words, take about 25% of the budget, $900 billion out of about a total $3.8 trillion, completely off the table from any effort to reduce government spending.  The hints came from White House Budget Director Jack Lew as well as a member of the President's National Economic Council who said that the spectre of an impending insolvency of Social Security should be viewed as distinct from reducing the budget.

Despite the fact that Lew himself said that the trust fund by which the entitlement program runs be able to make full benefit payments for only the next 26 years, the Obama adminstration will attempt to side-step Social Security if possible.  However, according to experts, many of Social Security's problems could be relatively easily-- in comparison to Medicare and Medicaid-- solved via a combination of raising the benchmark retirement age, lowering benefit payments, as well as increasing payroll taxes.

Thus, as Republicans and other associated budget-cutters had their hopes on finishing what President Bush failed to do in his second term when he tried to privatize the program in order to make it solvent, they will most likely not try to push legislation on their own for fear of political repercussions without any real chance of success.

And so set in stone becomes around a quarter of the federal budget from being reformed.  If the President is really looking to reduce government spending and reduce its debt, he just took a major component of the overall pie off the table.