Paul Krugman explains in a New York Times opinion piece why older adults and people with disabilities who support strengthening Medicare and Social Security need to vote in the upcoming presidential election: Medicare and Social Security are on the ballot. Only Joe Biden stands with them.
President Biden’s 2025 fiscal budget proposes to increase taxes to protect and strengthen Social Security and Medicare. In stark contrast, former President Donald Trump has been calling for cuts to these programs. Krugman reminds us that Biden’s position is more in keeping with the public than Obama’s.
In the past, President Obama and some other Democrats have called for limiting Medicare and Social Security spending, without regard to its consequences. Limits to Medicare spending would mean higher health care costs for older adults and people with disabilities. Limits to Social Security spending would mean lower benefits down the road and less retirement income.
President Biden is proposing higher Social Security benefits and paying for them through higher corporate taxes. Wealthy individuals, who now contribute to Social Security for just a part of the year, unlike everyone else, and who don’t make Social Security contributions on capital gains income, would have to pay their “fair share.”
To strengthen Medicare, President Biden proposes that people with annual incomes above $400,000 would pay a slightly higher Medicare tax rate. Their Medicare tax rate on earned and unearned income would increase from 3.8 percent to 5 percent. A majority of voters have always supported raising taxes on the wealthy to strengthen Medicare and Social Security.
In stark contrast, here’s what Trump says: “There is a lot you can do in terms of entitlements, in terms of cutting and in terms of also the theft and the bad management of entitlements.” The Trump campaign insists that Trump did not actually mean “cutting.”
Here’s more from Just Care:
- Expand Social Security, don’t means test it
- Beware of criminals stealing Social Security benefits
- Financial scams: Beware of strangers offering help
- Republicans support “backroom scheme” to cut Social Security and Medicare
- Biden brought down the price of insulin significantly; a Trump presidency could undo that
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