Slate has an interesting article about Social Security… not really interesting in that it says anything new, but I like it because it appears to have a bounty of facts, and summarizes a lot of the issues succinctly.

In 1950, more than 45 percent of men 65 or older were still in the labor force. By 2003, that percentage had plunged below 20. Five years ago, a study showed that men and women were retiring five and six years earlier, respectively, than their predecessors did 45 years before. Why? Because they could.