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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: steve dietrich who wrote (682130)	5/12/2005 11:24:12 AM
From: Kenneth E. Phillipps	Respond to of 769670

Survivor benefits could shrink under Bush proposal Administration prepares for House panel hearings on Social Security By DAVID ESPO Associated Press WASHINGTON - President Bush's preferred approach for Social Security would mean smaller survivor benefits for middle and upper-income children and widows than they are now promised, a top administration official said Wednesday. ADVERTISEMENT At the same time, Bush envisions no changes in the benefit system for the disabled, said Allan Hubbard, chairman of the National Economic Council and the administration's point man on Social Security. In addition to retirees, Social Security provides benefits to the disabled as well as to children younger than 18 who have lost a working parent. Surviving spouses can also qualify for a benefit until the child turns 16. "The president is committed to making sure the disabled are taken care of just as they've been promised they'd be taken care of," Hubbard said. Bush also believes his approach "will provide adequate and reasonable benefits for beneficiaries, which includes survivors, widows and the retirees," he said. Fund being drained Other administration officials were more specific in saying the changes Bush has in mind would apply to surviving children and widows. "It's tied to the worker's benefits. If the worker's benefits grow more slowly, then the survivors' benefits will" do the same, said Cathie Martin, a White House spokeswoman. "However, if we don't do anything, they're going to be cut" anyway, she said. She referred to the official forecast by the Social Security Board of Trustees, which predicts the program will begin paying out more in benefits than it receives from payroll taxes in 2017. That forecast predicts the program's trust funds will be drained in 2041, after which federal law mandate benefit cuts. The interview occurred in the run-up to Social Security hearings before the House Ways and Means Committee, a new phase in Bush's struggle to win legislation from Congress. "We're already kind of taking the next step, and the president kind of handed the ball to us," said Rep. Jim McCrery, R-La., chairman of the panel's Social Security subcommittee. Hubbard said the administration welcomed the hearings as a "signal that the legislative process is getting serious." Progress has been slow on the measure, with polls indicating public opposition to personal accounts, Democratic lawmakers almost unanimously opposed to them and many Republicans reluctant to make major changes in the program. Bush has urged enactment of a bill that guarantees permanent solvency for the program at the same time as it creates a system of personal accounts for younger workers. The accounts would be funded through a portion of payroll taxes. With future guaranteed benefits trimmed to help restore solvency, the theory is that retirees would have the proceeds of the personal accounts to make up some of the difference. Bush has stressed that the personal accounts would allow millions of Americans to retire with a nest egg to be passed along to heirs — something the current Social Security system does not provide. At the same time, White House officials said during the day that about 15 percent of all retirees under Bush's plan would likely not be able to pass along a Social Security inheritance — a figure that rises to 30 percent for those with lower lifetime wages. They would have to spend their entire personal account to make sure they remained out of poverty in their older years, according to tentative administration projections. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------