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In a blog post, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, who served as director of the CBO between 2003 and 2005, called the long-term projections report "a serial horror story in which the greatest economic power ever to grace the globe sails directly into self-inflicted crisis, suffering and decline." Holtz-Eakin currently serves as the president of the American Action Forum, a conservative think tank.

While this year's horror story is in many senses a rewrite of last year's, the outcome is a bit scarier in the updated report.

In 2016, CBO projected total debt would be 141 percent of GDP 30 years down the road. The increased projection of 150 percent of debt-to-GDP is due mostly to CBO's downward projections in economic growth.

On balance, the plot of the country's budget story remains the same: federal spending is expected to increase more quickly than the economy will grow, due to spending outlays on Social Security, Medicare, and the cost of servicing the country's debt.

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Going forward, the country will age as population growth slows over historical averages. Today, 15 percent of the population is age 65 or older. By 2047 that portion grows to 22 percent.

That change goes a long way to understanding the projected explosion in annual budget deficits. In 2017, the deficit is projected to be 2.9 percent of GDP. By 2047, the annual deficit will be 9.8 percent of GDP.

Spending on Social Security and federal health programs accounts for 54 percent of federal non-interest spending today, compared to an average of 37 percent of spending over the past 50 years.

But by 2047 that figure increases to 67 percent, according to the CBO. Spending on Social Security peaks in 2028, as Baby Boomers begin to die off.

The CBO bases its projections on current law, and does not account for the Trump administration's policy proposals that it says will bump GDP to 3 percent, which would be more than the 1.9 percent average GDP growth the CBO is projecting over the next decade.

Under current law, Social Security's Disability Insurance trust fund will be exhausted in 2023, and the larger Old-Age and Survivors' Insurance trust fund will be exhausted in calendar year 2031. When combining the balances, the trust funds are depleted by 2030.

If the trust funds were exhausted, current law would prohibit Congress from paying benefits in excess of available funds, which would be the amount of revenue generated by annual payroll taxes and taxes on retirees' Social Security benefits. CBO says an across-the-board 28 percent cut in Social Security benefits would be needed in 2031, when the OASI fund is projected to be depleted.

The cost of delaying entitlement reform

Under its mandate, the CBO is restricted from advancing policy prescriptions.

While the sausage making of budget and entitlement law falls to Congress, the CBO does give some idea of what levels of new taxes or cuts to entitlement benefits would be needed to reduce projected debt-to-GDP levels.

The longer Congress waits to address annual budget deficits, the greater new taxes and or benefits cuts would have to be to maintain current debt levels.

But implementing new taxes or spending cuts too quickly could slow economic growth and lead to reduced federal revenues.

If Congress were to set the goal of maintaining the current 77 percent debt level in 2047, the budget would require 10 percent in new tax revenues, or a 9 percent cut in spending.

Either solution would cut the deficit in 2018 by $380 billion. If Congress chose to slow short-term deficits by implementing a 10 percent increase in new taxes, it would cost American households $1,300 in new taxes in 2018, on average.

If Congress chose to reduce spending by 9 percent, the result would be an average reduction of $1,700 for Social Security beneficiaries in 2018.