<Li> Program annual cash surplus (or deficit if negative) = program revenues - program expenses </Li> <P> "Program revenues" has several components, including payroll tax contributions, taxation of benefits, and an accounting entry to reflect recent payroll tax cuts during 2011 and 2012, to make the fund "whole" as if these tax cuts had not occurred . These all add to the program revenues . </P> <P> During 2016, the initial balance as of January 1 was $2,780 billion . An additional $710 billion in payroll tax revenue and $87 billion in interest added to the Fund during 2016, while expenses of $776 billion were removed from the Fund, for a December 31, 2016 balance of $2,801 billion (i.e., $2,780 + $710 + $87 - $776 = $2,801). </P> <P> On February 2, 2005, President George W. Bush made Social Security a prominent theme of his State of the Union Address . One consequence was increased public attention to the nature of the Social Security Trust Fund . Unlike a typical private pension plan, the Social Security Trust Fund does not hold any marketable assets to secure workers' paid - in contributions . Instead, it holds non-negotiable United States Treasury bonds and U.S. securities backed "by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government". The trust funds have been invested primarily in non-marketable Treasury debt, first, because the Social Security Act prohibits "prefunding" by investment in equities or corporate bonds and, second, because of a general desire to avoid large swings in the Treasuries market that would otherwise result if Social Security invested large sums of payroll tax receipts in marketable government bonds or redeemed these marketable government bonds to pay benefits . </P>

What is the current balance of the social security trust fund