According to an email from Social Security Works, “Just before Congress left for the holidays, Rep. Sam Johnson (R-TX) introduced the ‘Social Security Reform Act’ – an impressive wish list of devastating Social Security cuts and upper-income tax breaks.
“Our friends at the Economic Policy Institute Policy Center have crunched the numbers on the Johnson plan, and they are even scarier than we thought.
“More than 2/3s of beneficiaries would see, on average, a 27% cut in benefits. This includes:
- Raising the retirement age to 69 (equivalent to a 13.5 percent across-the-board cut)
- Changing the benefit formula (9 percent average cut)
- Slashing the cost-of-living adjustment (13 percent average cut)
- Some long-lived beneficiaries could see cuts of up to 74 percent!
- Eliminates the taxation of benefits on high earners-giving a tax cut to those who need it least while reducing revenue back into the Social Security trust fund”
