Social Security is like a Rorschach Test. Some look into the federal retirement program's future and see nothing but doom and gloom: It is bankrupt, economically untenable, and fiscally unsustainable. Others see a solid institution — the strongest cords of America's safety net — that just needs a few tweaks, maybe even an expansion.

The Social Security Administration on Wednesday released its annual trustees' report, giving us a look at its finances. The trustees, including Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew, estimate that the Social Security trust fund will run out of money in 2034. But don't expect this to settle any debates.

Your perspective on Social Security may depend on how far you are from retirement. While older Americans can't imagine a world without Social Security, most millennials have become fatalistic about it — they assume the benefit will disappear before they reach retirement (if they are ever able to retire). Only 6 percent of them expect current benefits to be there when they hit 67 years old — the full benefit age for those born in 1960 or later — and 51 percent expect the program to go entirely extinct, according to a 2014 Pew Research Center survey.