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A Budget For Social Insecurity
By Kathy Angiolillo, Deputy Director of Legislative Affairs, Remember the promise to "Save Social Security First?" While the government had a budget surplus, Republicans and Democrats pledged to use Social Security payroll taxes to only pay benefits or pay down debt. President Bush said in his 2000 campaign that "for years, politicians in both parties have dipped into the trust fund to pay for more spending-and I will stop it." The economic recession, war on terrorism and last year's tax cut have changed the government's bottom line. There is no budget surplus from non-Social Security revenues. The New York Times recently reported that President Bush's proposed budget taps both the Social Security and Medicare Trust Funds to pay for other programs "every year through 2013, ultimately diverting more than $1.4 trillion in Social Security." (1) The President's new budget would provide big increases for defense and homeland security. It proposes $675 billion in additional tax cuts over the next 10 years, but many domestic programs would have to be cut. Among them are energy assistance for low-income seniors, Medicaid payments to public hospitals, and despite the big increase for defense funding, veterans with incomes as low as $24,000 would be required to pay a $1,500 deductible to use the Veterans Affairs health care system. The President's budget also uses questionable assumptions to mask the true size of the deficit. For example, the Bush budget estimates that Medicare will only grow by 4.6% a year over the next five years. But in the past decade, Medicare grew an average of 7.6% a year. The Bush Medicare budget estimate over the next decade is $300 billion less than estimated by the CBO. This in effect cuts the Medicare budget. It comes at a time not only when more money will be needed to provide coverage for growing numbers of people coming onto Medicare, but also to provide prescription drug benefits. Many Members of Congress that we have met with don't want to allow this to happen; yet they will soon be faced with tough choices. They need to know how you feel on the issues. Make no mistake; you hold the key in an election year because seniors make up as much as 25% of the vote. Contact your Members of Congress by e-mail, phone, fax, or by a letter to your Members' district home office. Your help to "save" Social Security and prevent Medicare cuts is more vital than ever. (1) Source: "Social Security Pledges May Haunt Both Parties," Alison Mitchell, The New York Times, February 6, 2002. March 2002 | ||||||||
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