On the unemployment payments to individuals, there are a lot of legal questions about the money the President wants to use to pay for this. He calls for billion of funding from the Department of Homeland Security's Disaster Relief Fund that is normally used for hurricanes, tornadoes, and massive fires to be shifted over to unemployment. .In the months ahead, TSCL will continue to advocate for these and other legislative efforts that would improve the solvency of Social Security and Medicare without cutting benefits for seniors. .Despite tightening the law, Congress did not fix a policy loophole that would be inadvertently triggered with the passage of comprehensive immigration reform legislation. When determining entitlement for insured status, and when calculating the initial retirement benefit, the Social Security Administration (SSA) uses all reported earnings from covered employment in the United States, even if the earnings were from illegal or "unauthorized" work. (2) .Protecting Medicare for current beneficiaries and saving it for future generations is one of my most important responsibilities as a Member of Congress. It is no secret that demographic and economic factors will not allow us to continue the program unaltered. There are 10,000 baby boomers retiring every day, and when these programs were first enacted there were more than 40 workers for every 1 retiree. Today, that number is below 3 workers per retiree and headed towards 2 to Health care costs continue to rise much faster than inflation. In order to ensure the solvency of a program that senior citizens have come to rely on, changes must be made. The days of doing nothing, burying our heads in the sand, and pretending the status quo is sustainable are over. .This week, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced its preliminary 2015 payment rate changes for the Medicare Advantage (MA) program. In addition, The Senior Citizens League (TSCL) saw two key bills gain support. .The Senior Citizens League supports legislation that would raise the income thresholds that subject Social Security benefits to taxation. .Last week House Appropriations Military Construction-VA Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) pushed a Department of Veterans Affairs official at a hearing to work on a plan to offer coronavirus vaccines to veterans even if they are not eligible for VA health care. .The "house calls" can be money-makers for health plans when they document medical problems like complications from diabetes or heart trouble. Health plans profit because Medicare pays higher rates for sicker patients using a billing formula based on the patient's "risk score." Plans can receive thousands of dollars in higher payments from Medicare even though the insurer incurs no additional costs for covering Medicare services for your brother. .Unlike the temporary payroll tax cuts, which wouldn't affect Social Security's finances, the diversion of Social Security contributions into private accounts would substantially reduce the amount of money available to pay current beneficiaries. This "privatization" of Social Security contributions would drain the Social Security Trust Fund in short order and require the transfer of TRILLIONS of dollars from the U.S. Treasury into the Social Security Trust Fund in the coming decades to continue paying current benefits.