Time to Enhance Social Security
Floor Speech
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Mr. LARSON of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, I rise this early afternoon to talk about the Nation's number one antipoverty program for the elderly, the number one antipoverty program for children, and the program that provides more disability benefits to our veterans than the VA. I am talking about Social Security, Mr. Speaker.
This might be news to some of the viewers in our audience and at home, but Congress has not acted to enhance Social Security in more than 53 years. Richard Nixon was the President of the United States the last time Congress acted on this much-needed benefit, the number one antipoverty program for the elderly and the number one antipoverty program for children
Instead, what we find is our colleagues on the other side, the Republican Study Committee, have said that what we need to do is cut Social Security by $1.5 trillion over the next 10 years. In the process, Mr. Speaker, what they have done also is said that, yes, initially what we need to do is to raise the age of people.
What they don't tell the recipients is for every year you raise the age, that is a 7 percent cut in benefits. What they have proposed is a 21 percent across-the-board cut for Social Security. My good friend Jodey Arrington is the chairman of the Budget Committee. The Budget Committee meets this week, and I hope they get to explore the myths regarding Social Security.
It has nothing to do with the debt or the deficit of this country. The chief actuary will lay that out.
Mr. Speaker, you might be surprised to know that in your district, there are over 179,000 recipients. In your district, that brings in $306 million monthly. Where do they spend that money, Mr. Speaker? Right back in your district. They go to the pharmacy. They go to the grocery store. They put gas in their tank. They pay their rent. They pay their mortgage. They haven't had an increase since 1971.
It is long overdue for Congress to act. The President has put forward a proposal. Democrats have a proposal. All we need to do is vote.
If you have a better idea, by all means, put it out there. If you don't, at least allow a vote to take place so you can minimally help out the people in your district. On average, every Member of Congress gets more than $200 million monthly that comes into their district. There is no better economic development plan for people in your district because of where they are going to spend that money.
Nobody gets wealthy on Social Security. The average for a male is $18,000, and for a female, it is $14,000. For more than 5 million of our fellow Americans, they get below-poverty-level checks from the wealthiest Nation in the world. My colleagues on the other side of the aisle are out proposing cuts for the very wealthy, the top 1 percent, and won't even take care of the 5 million people who have paid into a system and get below-poverty-level checks.
While we are speaking of tax cuts, as I noted to Mr. Arrington, how about the 23 million Americans who will receive a tax cut under the Democratic plan? How about we look at working Americans and give them a tax cut in their retirement instead of double taxing them on Social Security?
Twenty-three million Americans will benefit directly from this program that we have put forward. President Biden has said that we will pay for this as well by lifting the cap on people making over $400,000.
Now, to understand this, as Linda Sanchez said in the committee the other day, look at those expensive professional football or baseball players. For a baseball player, he is done paying Social Security after his first at-bat while the rest of America continues to pay into the system.
There are several millionaires and billionaires who circumvent the law completely and pay nothing into Social Security. Meanwhile, those men and women who defend this Nation--the firefighters, the police officers, and schoolteachers--many were double-victimized by WEP and GPO. We repealed WEP and GPO.
How about a vote, Mr. Speaker?
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