Social Security’s facing across-the-board benefit cuts in six years, and older Americans want solutions not opaquely operating committees, AARP says.
A bipartisan group of senators introduced legislation last week to fast-track any Social Security-saving bills that could shore up the dwindling trust fund that supplements payroll taxes and keep benefits 100% intact.
A bipartisan, seven-member Social Security Advisory Board would draft a bill to keep the program’s trust funds solvent for at least the next half century. The Protecting Retirement Opportunities and Maintaining Income Security for Everyone, or PROMISE, Act, would then be introduced in the House and Senate by congressional leaders before being considered by committees, which could hold hearings and revise the legislation.
Some prominent thinktanks like the Bipartisan Policy Center and the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget support the move to jumpstart a path towards keeping Social Security solvent.
BPC endorsed the proposed legislation as a “serious bipartisan process to break the status quo of inaction,” while CRFB said it hoped the proposal “jumpstarts a much-needed process to secure Social Security.”
However, AARP “strongly” opposes the bill. The nonprofit, nonpartisan advocate for 125 million Americans age 50 and older says Congress urgently needs to address Social Security’s finances, but there’s no reason for lawmakers to farm out that work to another body as it would in the PROMISE Act.
“We strongly object to fast-tracking Social Security changes through Congress,” AARP Chief Advocacy and Engagement Officer Nancy LeaMond wrote in a July 21 letter addressed to Sen. Dick Durbin, the Democratic Whip from Illinois, and Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-Louisiana. Durbin and Cassidy are among the lawmakers who introduced the PROMISE Act proposal.
How Would the PROMISE Act Work?
The PROMISE Act would create an “independent, bipartisan” Social Security Advisory Board (SSAB) to develop and send a base bill to Congress that would ensure the Social Security trust funds are funded for at least 50 years.
Majority leaders of the Senate and the House, or if not, any member of Congress, could introduce the base bill, which would then be referred to the Senate Finance Committee and House Ways and Means Committee for a chance to hold hearings and amend it.
The committees would vote, or report, on the base bill. If they don’t, the bill would automatically be placed on the Senate and House calendars.
The majority leaders of the Senate and House could move the bill forward, as could any other member of Congress. Similarly, anyone in Congress could offer amendments after the motion to proceed.
Finally, the Senate and House would vote on the bill after 100 hours of consideration. Final passage would require a three-fifths vote in the Senate and a majority vote in the House.
“Our bipartisan proposal opens Congress to debate this issue in a transparent, fair, and bipartisan way,” Durbin said in a release. “We were elected to solve problems—and there’s no greater problem than the solvency and future of Social Security.”
Why Does AARP Oppose the Bill?
Though Durbin touts transparency, AARP said the bill offers the opposite. It said the PROMISE Act limits debate and amendments and that could allow lawmakers to cut Social Security payments.
“Strengthening Social Security should happen through regular order, in full public view, with openness and transparency — rather than through a process that limits the type of amendments and sets arbitrary procedural deadlines to short-circuit the debate,” said Nancy LeaMond, AARP’s chief advocacy and engagement officer.
The bill calls for the advisory board’s proposal to be introduced in Congress by Sept. 17 or the first day after that in which the House and Senate are in session, she said. Lawmakers could then hold hearings and amend the SSAB plan but would not need to vote to advance the measure out of key congressional committees, as is typical for federal legislation.
Instead, if they don’t vote by Nov. 9, the bill would move straight to the House and Senate floors — during a post-election “lame-duck session” of Congress, “when departing members are completely unaccountable to voters,” LeaMond said.
Among her other issues with the bill, she argues that it caps the time to consider, amend and debate the bill at 100 hours and includes language that limits the types of amendments allowed.
“If every other bill in Congress goes through regular order, why would something as important as Social Security get a special process that cuts off debate, that limits the kind of amendments, that limits the kind of things you can talk about?” said Bill Sweeney, AARP’s senior vice president for Government Affairs. “To us, that just doesn’t make sense.”
AARP Also Opposes Other Bills That Create Social Security Commissions
AARP also said it opposes two other bills that would create commissions to address Social Security’s long-term solvency:
One House bill, sponsored by Reps. Tom Cole, R-Oklahoma, and Tom Suozzi, D-New York, creates a 13-member commission tasked with providing recommendations and legislation to Congress on how to shore up Social Security’s finances. That bill would allow a proposed plan to move forward on an expedited, up-or-down vote. Individual members of Congress would not be able to offer amendments, AARP said.
Another proposal would create a fiscal commission to reduce the national debt and annual deficits and shore up trust funds dedicated not just for Social Security but also for Medicare and the nation’s highways. But “Social Security is a self-financed system that does not contribute a penny to the national debt, and Congress should not put it in the crosshairs of unrelated budget debates,” LeaMond said. “Instead, any changes to Social Security should focus on the financial and retirement security of the American people.”
What Should Congress Do Instead?
Social Security provides retirement benefits to 71 million Americans to give them some financial security. It’s “a promise: that after a lifetime of hard work, you will receive the money you have earned,” LeaMond said. “Keeping that promise is one of Congress’s most solemn responsibilities.”
“If regular order is the gold standard for routine legislative matters, it certainly should be the standard for something as important as Social Security,” LeaMond said, noting that the last time Social Security approached trust fund depletion, in the early 1980s, there were no short cuts.
“Congress held dozens of days of hearings and markups, over 100 floor votes on amendments, and a full conference committee on the final bill. The fast-track process in your bill would move Congress in the opposite direction, making that level of scrutiny far less likely at precisely the moment when openness, deliberation, and accountability matter most,” she said.
Medora Lee is a money, markets and personal finance reporter at USA TODAY. You can reach her at [email protected] and subscribe to our free Daily Money newsletter for personal finance tips and business news every Monday through Friday morning.
Reporting by Medora Lee, USA TODAY / USA TODAY. USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect.
