Under Social Security, payments to current retirees are paid from taxes collected from current workers. from taxes collected from retired workers. from taxes collected from retired workers. as long as the government had funds available. as the government collected revenues from tariffs and excise taxes in the years Social Security payments were made. Many economists believe that some of the key causes of the Great Depession (1929 most of 1930s) were related to the world still recovering from World War i (called \"The Great War\" at the time) taxes that were too low a series of faulty macroeconomic policies a large reduction in the labor force The Great Recession (2007-2009) was characterized by O Interest rates above 10% O an almost complete breakdown of the borrowing/lending markets, leading to a large increase in banks' holding of excess reserves, a behavior which persists even today O unemployment and decreases in real GDP that were worse than the Great Recession O massive deficits caused by increases in military spending