House Budget Chair Signals Big Social Security Reforms A-Coming

[antigop]

Source: Talking Points Memo


The new House Budget Committee chairman hinted Monday that he had big plans for Social Security reform in the next two years, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

A week after the House voted on a rule that critics say could force a manufactured crisis in the disability program in late 2016, a potential leverage point for Republicans aiming for changes, Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) told a conservative audience that he wanted his committee to tackle Social Security.

"What I’m hopeful is what the Budget Committee will be able do is to is begin to normalize the discussion and debate about Social Security. This is a program that right now on its current course will not be able to provide 75 or 80 percent of the benefits that individuals have paid into in a relatively short period of time," he said at a Heritage Action for America event in Washington, D.C., according to AJC. "That’s not a responsible position to say, ‘You don’t need to do anything to do it.’"

Price, whose predecessor Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) never put forward major reform proposals in his otherwise ambitious budgets, offered means-testing and increasing the eligibility age as possibilities. He also hinted at privatizing Social Security.



Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/tom-price-social-security-reforms

[n2doc]

1. Democrats need to stand behind SS and let the repubs hang themselves

No "Grand Bargains"!

[Yo_Mama]

3. Then the Dems need to go for taxes to fund it.

Because the problem is funding. And if the disability is extended the way we have always done it before, then the run-out date for SS is going to be sharply advanced.

It's time to figure out a revenue stream to properly fund DI and SS.

http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/TRSUM/index.html

To summarize overall Social Security finances, the Trustees have traditionally emphasized the financial status of the theoretical combined trust funds for DI and for Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI). The combined trust funds, and expenditures that can be financed in the context of the combined trust funds, are theoretical constructs because there is no legal authority to finance one program’s expenditures with the other program’s taxes or reserves. Social Security’s total expenditures have exceeded non-interest income of its combined trust funds since 2010 and the Trustees estimate that Social Security cost will exceed non-interest income throughout the 75-year projection period. The Trustees project that this annual cash-flow deficit will average about $77 billion between 2014 and 2018 before rising steeply as income growth slows to its sustainable trend rate after the economic recovery is complete while the number of beneficiaries continues to grow at a substantially faster rate than the number of covered workers. Redemption of trust fund asset reserves from the General Fund of the Treasury will provide the resources needed to offset Social Security’s annual aggregate cash-flow deficits. Since the cash-flow deficit will be less than interest earnings through 2019, reserves of the combined trust funds will continue to grow but not by enough to prevent the ratio of reserves to one year’s projected cost (the combined trust fund ratio) from declining. (This ratio peaked in 2008, declined through 2013, and is expected to decline steadily in future years.) After 2019, Treasury will redeem trust fund asset reserves to the extent that program cost exceeds tax revenue and interest earnings until depletion of combined trust fund reserves in 2033, the same year projected in last year’s Trustees Report. Thereafter, tax income would be sufficient to pay about three-quarters of scheduled benefits through the end of the projection period in 2088

The 2033 SS & DI benefit cut date should provide no one any comfort. That assumes that DI shortfall will be funded by taking money out of SS, which indeed must be legislated by Congress because otherwise it is illegal. Otherwise the SS trust fund might last considerably longer, or it might be exhausted a year later.

This should worry all those in their 40s, 50s and 60s. The longer we wait to fund the gap with increased taxes, the more difficult it will be to accomplish it:


Right now we need to raise payroll taxes (or get an equivalent amount through other taxes) by about 2.5-2.7%. Wait another ten years, and that number gets higher.

[RunInCircles]

12. The Trustees report is a propaganda piece for the Pete Peterson Plan to cut social security

This whole graph is propaganda tool. The graph represents how much working people in the year will underpay the current level of benefits with projections of declining numbers of working people and seniors living much much longer. A farer projection of Social "Security solvency is obtained by assessing whether enough money is contributed each year to cover the accrued benefit to the current worker. The answer to this question is that the fund is very nearly in balance. Any projected funding shortfall could be easily covered with a modest increase in the cap. So I disagree with the projection and the methodology behind this projection. More over any perceived deficit could be easily corrected by asking the extraordinarily wealthy to pay at the same rate the rest of us do.

[cstanleytech]

2. I hope they are stupid enough to try and touch this third rail because it will be their undoing

and I will laugh like hell over it.

[24601]

4. Underestimating the opposition leads to defeat - and both parties licked wound from past Social

Security battles.

I'll expect proposals for changes that don't apply to anybody within 10 years of eligibility t, changes will o draw non-disability benefits. In other words, as long as you are 52+, you will be insulated from major program changes.

I've told my kids (21 & 19) not to feel bad but that the funding war is over and they lost. Don't feel bad, I tell them - just get ready to pay lots and lots because your mom and I will be receiving our Social Security as long as we continue to live.

When they ask why, I explain that we vote - always. Their generation? Not so much.

[cstanleytech]

5. Oh I am not underestimating them at all as I think they actually are stupid enough to do this. nt

[msongs]

6. dems did nothing when they had congress and the white house. too bad eh? nt

[blkmusclmachine]

10. That's what happens when both teams are on the same side.

[dixiegrrrrl]

7. See? Carlin was right...

"now they are coming for your Soc. Sec.
And they will get it, too."

[24601]

8. They sure will get it if you don't pay your student loans. n/t

[brentspeak]

9. Obama deliberately went out of his way NOT to protect Social Security

If Obama actually gave a damn, he would've stood on the bully pulpit and been on the warpath six years ago to call for the raising and/or elimination of the FICA cap. A polite and mild suggestion he made about it three years ago just doesn't cut it. He knew full well that eventually the Repubs would grab the majority and be able to call the shots.

[RandiFan1290]

11. OMG no way!

How did this happen!!!!

[CrispyQ]

13. Anxious to see if Obama will wield the veto pen or order commemorative bill signing pen sets. -nt

[CountAllVotes]

14. Billions of $$$ for wars without end ..

Billions of dollars in aid/etc. for other countries.

What do they do to their own citizens that HAVE WORKED and HAVE PAID into this "disability" system for over 10 years?

Instead now everyone (yes everyone) must live in fear that the pittance received will be cut by 20%!!

Estimates say that about 9,000,000 persons receive SSDI in America with an average payment if $1100 a month or about $13,000 a year = poverty level in many cases.

This is not something to be proud of!

This is a moral disgrace!

I sincerely hope that President Obama uses that veto pen on this one!