John,

Republicans have been lying about Social Security for 84 years. FDR himself offered this warning, after the passage of the Social Security Act in 1935:

Let me warn you and let me warn the nation against the smooth evasion which says, “Of course we believe all these things; we believe in social security; we believe in work for the unemployed; we believe in saving homes. Cross our hearts and hope to die, we believe in all these things; but we do not like the way the present Administration is doing them. Just turn them over to us. We will do all of them—we will do more of them, we will do them better; and, most important of all, the doing of them will not cost anybody anything.”

But, my friends, these evaders are banking too heavily on the shortness of our memories. No one will forget that they had their golden opportunity—twelve long years of it.

Remember, too, that the first essential of doing a job well is to want to see the job done. Make no mistake about this: The Republican leadership today is not against the way we have done the job. The Republican leadership is against the job’s being done.

Social Security Works was founded to take the next step in the new deal, by expanding Social Security, enacting Medicare for All, and reining in Pharma's greed. Chip in to push back against these Republican lies!

Nancy Altman wrote a great piece on how we're going to do it. You can read that below.

Thanks!

Michael Phelan
Social Security Works

--Nancy's Email--

John,

Republican politicians want to cut Social Security. They never say so out loud, but their 2016 platform reveals the truth. In the section labeled, “Saving Social Security,” it proclaims, “As Republicans, we oppose tax increases…” Since Social Security cannot deficit spend and is projecting a shortfall in 2035 if Congress doesn’t act, that only leaves benefit cuts.

Representative John Larson (D-CT), the Chairman of the House of Representatives’ Subcommittee on Social Security, is trying to force his Republican colleagues into the open. Larson is the sponsor of the Social Security 2100 Act, which increases Social Security’s modest benefits.

We’ve built Social Security Works over the past decade to correct the record on our Social Security system. We’ve been successful because we’ve got people on our side. Chip in $5 to spread the TRUTH about Social Security!

The 2100 Act raises enough revenue to ensure that all benefits can be paid in full and on time through the year 2100 and beyond. Ninety percent of the Democrats in the House of Representatives are co-sponsors, but not a single Republican. Given their refusal to back his bill, Rep. Larson has urged Republicans to offer an alternative proposal — to no avail.

Inaction is not an option, unless your goal is to cut Social Security. The most recent Social Security Trustees' Report projects that with no action, benefits will be automatically reduced by 20 percent in 2035. As Chairman Larson has plainly stated, “The hard truth of the matter is that Republicans want to cut Social Security, and doing nothing achieves their goal.”

We have to make sure that Congress does the right thing, and recognizes that Social Security is an American solution, not a problem. Pitch in $5 to send a message to Congress!

Deflecting from their desire to cut Social Security, Republican politicians and their outside advocates have unleashed a barrage of misleading attacks about the 2100 Act and Social Security itself. A recent Heritage Foundation report, for example, attacked the 2100 Act and called for “significantly reducing” benefits of everyone but “those with the greatest need,” falsely claiming that doing so would “return Social Security to its goal of poverty prevention.”

Since this focus on need is a common tactic in today’s debate, it is important to confront it with the truth. The Heritage Foundation is utterly wrong about Social Security’s original goal. What it’s actually describing is the program that Social Security’s conservative opponents have tried to repeal and replace it with from the beginning.

Chip in $5 today! We’re focused on spreading the truth about Social Security, and keeping Republican lies from taking root in the American public.

Social Security was designed as wage insurance. Its goal has always been much more expansive than the alleviation of poverty, or even its prevention. The system’s purpose is, and always has been, to replace wages so that people are able to maintain their standards of living in the event of retirement, disability or death.

In 1931, years before signing the Social Security Act of 1935 into law, then-Governor of New York Franklin D. Roosevelt described his policy preference for wage insurance that provides, when wages are gone, “not merely…a roof over head and enough food, to keep body and soul together, but also enough income to maintain life during the balance of their days in accordance with the American standard of living."

In response, conservatives then and now have tried to convert Social Security into what the Heritage Foundation advocates in its piece attacking the 2100 Act. The 1936 Republican Party platform, for example, claimed that the Democrats, “while purporting to provide social security, have, in fact endangered it.” The Republicans advocated, that, in its place, “Every American citizen over sixty-five should receive the supplementary payment necessary to provide a minimum income sufficient to protect him or her from want.”

Repealing and replacing Social Security with a minimal benefit, unrelated to prior earnings, has been the unstated goal of opponents ever since. Notably, while the privatization part of President George W. Bush’s 2005 Social Security plan received the most attention, he also advocated a method of indexing benefits that would have gradually, but inexorably, resulted in subsistence-level benefits unrelated to prior earnings. That is not what Social Security is or has ever been.

In the Trump/McConnell era, Republicans have shown that they will lie and abuse power in any way they can to achieve their goals. Trump has called cutting Social Security and Medicare a good “second-term project”. Chip in $5 to make sure that doesn’t happen!

While opponents can argue that Social Security is poor welfare, since its benefits are not targeted to those most in need, it is indisputable that it is the best insurance available. In words still true today, President Franklin Roosevelt accused opponents of failing to disclose to working Americans that Social Security “is far more favorable to him than any policy that any private insurance company could afford to issue. That omission is deceit.”

Fortunately, that deceit is no longer possible. Having just celebrated its 84th anniversary, Social Security has stood the test of time. The American people know that it is the most cost-effective, efficient, universal, secure, and fair insurance around. It provides benefits not available in the private sector at any cost.

If conservative politicians and advocacy groups are sincere about assisting seniors and people with disabilities in need, they should join the effort to update the extremely inadequate, though essential, Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program. SSI is a means-tested program, financed from general revenue, separate and apart from Social Security. Unlike Social Security, SSI’s goal is to alleviate the poverty of impoverished seniors and people with disabilities.

In addition, if those policymakers and advocates truly want to strengthen Social Security’s protections, they should join those who are fighting to expand benefits for everyone. Those benefits are extremely modest by virtually any standard.

For voters who have a stake in Social Security — that is all of us — do not let those seeking your vote get by with platitudes about “saving” or “fixing” Social Security. And certainly not about “saving” it for those who “need” it. Find out if they support expanding Social Security. And if they don’t, the proper inference is that they support taking away the benefits you have earned.

There’s only one choice: We need to expand Social Security, not cut it. Together, that’s exactly what we’ll do.

Thank you,

Nancy Altman
President
Social Security Works