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  • Government Forecast_three More Years Of Historically Low Colas

    The President ordered a payroll tax deferral, not a cut, meaning the taxes will not be collected for a while but they will still be due at a later date. However, some observers have suggested that rather than give employees the additional money and then try to collect it back from them at the end of the year, employers will simply hold onto the money so that the employees would never see it in their paychecks. .Social Security recipients who have contacted The Senior Citizens League overwhelmingly feel that a higher COLA would be long overdue. They say that the COLA doesn't come close to keeping up with their actual cost increases. When prices rise rapidly at the same time that retirees are receiving a very low COLA, as is the case in 2021, this shortfall can produce long-term impacts on retirement income, and even health, when retired households without adequate retirement savings run short of cash before the month is over. "In email after email, we are hearing that people are cutting their spending on prescriptions and groceries because that's the last things they have left to cut," says Johnson. The Senior Citizens League works to strengthen Social Security benefits and the COLA. .This week, a House committee held a high-profile hearing on recent developments in the prescription drug market, and The Senior Citizens League (TSCL) saw support grow for one key bill. … Continued

  • Congressional Corner By Representative Fred Upton Mi 6

    This is a major blow to military retirees whose reasons for settling around a military base included getting the health care they were promised when they agreed to serve a career in the Armed Forces. .Finally, the Social Security Fairness Act (H.R.1205) from Congressman Rodney Davis (IL-13) gained ten new cosponsors this week, bringing the total up to 158 in the House. The bill, if adopted, would repeal two provisions of the Social Security Act that reduce the earned benefits of millions of state and local government employees each year. .For this week, lawmakers in the House and Senate remained in their home states and districts for the final week before they return to Washington following the Labor Day holiday. … Continued

I'm Entitled to a Pension for Work as a City Cop… .Key Social Security Bills Gain Support .The Covid-19 pandemic has both heightened the urgency of reining in pharmaceutical costs yet also made it harder for lawmakers to act. Drug makers say limiting their profits could hamper efforts to create a vaccine against the virus, but medicines to treat it come with significant price tags. Gilead Sciences, Inc., set the price for its widely used Remdesivir at ,340 for a five-day treatment. ."We need to get committees working again. We need to recommit to a rational, functioning appropriations process," McConnell said on the floor of the Senate during the first full day of his Senate leadership. "We need to open up. the legislative process in a way that allows more amendments from both sides." .However, one week ago a federal judge in California issued a ruling stopping the implementation of the rule because of the "government's failure to complete the notice and comment procedures required by the Administrative Procedure Act." .Last month, the Social Security Trustees released their annual report on the program's financial outlook, and they projected that Social Security beneficiaries will face a cut in benefits if lawmakers fail to pass legislation to extend the program's solvency past 203In order for reforms to be phased in gradually and with minimal impact on current or future retirees, Congress will need to adopt comprehensive Social Security reform legislation in the very near future. .Does TSCL receive government funding? .Studies show the vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna, the only two approved by the U.S. so far, are fully effective at one to two weeks after the second dose, depending on the vaccine; while they prevent disease, it is not clear whether they prevent asymptomatic infection .Sources: "The Out-of-Pocket Cost Burden For Specialty Drugs in Medicare Part D in 2019," Juliette Cubanski, Wyatt Koma, Tricia Neuman, Kaiser Family Foundation, January 201https://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/the-out-of-pocket-cost-burden-for-specialty-drugs-in-medicare-part-d-in-2019/ "How Trump's Latest Plan to Cut Drug Prices Will Affect You," Katie Thomas and Reed Abelson, The New York Times, February 5, 2019/