- It’s Time to Restore and Strengthen SSI
(May 2013)
Today, far too many older adults and persons with disabilities who now receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits struggle to make ends meet. While the program ensures that many elderly poor have some income, too many recipients are homeless or doing without basic necessities. And, far too many SSI recipients are deeper in poverty ...
- Annual Report Summarizes 40th Year
(April 2013)
Last year marked NSCLC’s 40th anniversary. While we celebrated that milestone, we also recognized that challenges to the rights of low income older adults to quality health care, economic security or access to the courts have by no means disappeared.
In the past year, NSCLC:
Led efforts to ensure consumer protection for the elderly poor as ...
- Long Term Care Commission Should Right the Imbalance In How Medicaid Pays for Long Term Services and Supports
(March 2013)
President Obama has just appointed the final members of the Commission on Long Term Care. This new Commission has six months to accomplish one objective: develop a plan for the establishment, implementation and financing of a comprehensive, coordinated, and high-quality system that ensures the availability of long-term services and supports (LTSS) for individuals who ...
- FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
(February 2013)
Forty years ago, at the age of 29, I came to the NSCLC to advocate for the rights of low-income older adults. My mother did not understand why I would leave a large private law firm and give up the commensurate salary to work in a poverty law program. I have never once regretted ...
- The Chained CPI — Still a Stealth Benefit Cut
(January 2013)
The proposal to cut benefits by using the Chained Consumer Price Index (CPI)calculate the annual cost of living adjustment (COLA) for Social Security, Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or other federal benefits programs remains alive.
The good news is that it is not part of the fiscal cliff agreement. The bad news is that some policymakers ...
- Let’s Not Undo New Deal or Great Society Programs
(October 2012)
There are many loud voices calling for drastic changes to New Deal and Great Society programs such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. These vital programs have made it possible for most older Americans to live out their lives in relative economic security, free from the worry and fear that poverty can bring.
Before Social ...
- It’s That Serious An Election
(September 2012)
The stakes couldn’t be higher. For low-income older adults, the outcome of this election is likely to be more significant than any in recent memory. The very future of health care and economic security for the nation’s seniors is on the line. Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid are all in the political spotlight.
Just about ...
- Conventions and the Elderly Poor
(August 2012)
At the Democratic Party convention in Charlotte, NC where I was this week, former President Bill Clinton defended Medicaid and talked about the dire consequences for the elderly and people with disabilities if Medicaid is block granted as the Republican presidential and vice presidential candidates have pledged.
“If that happens, I don’t know what those ...
- Happy Birthday Social Security and Medicare!
(July 2012)
Social Security is 77 years old this month and Medicare just turned 47. Celebrate their birthdays, but also recognize that both programs are under siege.
The two programs are jointly responsible for providing basic economic security and quality health care for millions of older Americans. Without Social Security, nearly half of today’s elderly would have ...
- Court’s Medicaid Limit Threatens Millions
(June 2012)
The care of 3.3 million uninsured young seniors is now dangerously threatened by the Supreme Court’s decision to narrow the expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The decision also raises questions about the future care for 16 million older persons and persons with disabilities.
Medicaid is a shared federal and state program ...
