The new Democratic national platform approved this week in Philadelphia includes seismic changes in the Social Security programs. It includes a substantial increase in the average benefits to seniors while requiring wealthier Americans to pay a much larger share of the overall cost.
The platform, heavily influenced by Sanders, who calls it the “most progressive” in the party’s history, in close collaboration with Hillary Clinton’s camp, rejects any notion that Social Security should be restructured to prevent a cash crisis or a federal debt crisis.
Instead, the newly minted campaign document would extend the Social Security trust fund’s solvency 50 years or more by lifting a cap on the payroll tax to force wealthier Americans to assume a much larger share of the program’s cost. It would also increase average monthly benefits to seniors and recast cost-of-living adjustments to make it more advantageous to seniors with substantial medical expenses.
– The Fiscal Times