Republicans' Rule A Death Sentence For 9 Million Disabled Americans

This article was originally published by Scientific American.---------
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By: Rmuse
Thursday, February, 12th, 2015, 10:02 am   
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Over the past four years that Republicans have controlled one-half of Congress, most of their energy was focused on killing Americans' jobs. Now that they control the entire Congress thanks to the billionaire Koch brothers, Republicans have shifted their focus slightly away from just killing Americans' jobs to killing disabled Americans; nearly nine million disabled Americans.
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That was the conclusion of the acting Social Security Commissioner Carolyn Colvin during a Senate Budget Committee hearing focused on addressing the recent rule change by House Republicans forbidding the Trust from shifting funds within the program for disabled Americans. In answer to a query from Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR) about what the consequences are for disabled Americans if the rule change stays in effect, she said a failure by Congress to shore up the Disability Insurance Trust Fund would be deadly for its beneficiaries. Colvin said, "I don't want to be dramatic, but I've worked with this population my whole career. We [would] give them a death sentence."
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Due to the House Republicans' unilateral "rule change," the disability fund is projected to be exhausted by the end of 2016, and if Congress fails to correct the Republican rule change beneficiaries will receive a 20 percent cut in benefits. Apparently, the Senate is taking up the issue because lawmakers are divided over how to deal with the shortfall instead of doing what they have done 11 times in the past; reallocate funds from within the Trust.
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