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The system, however, isn't estimated to be able to pay scheduled benefits in full for that long. The Social Security Trustees estimate that the Trust Funds will become fully insolvent by the end of 203When Trustees use the term insolvent that means the point at which all the extra revenues that were borrowed, now totaling more than .6 trillion, have run out, and there are no more IOUs held by the Trust Fund. Some people believe that, when the Trust Funds are exhausted, Social Security will be completely unable to pay benefits. But that's not the case..McCaskill brought her own brother's experience with pharmaceutical companies as an example to illustrate the way companies wine and dine the doctors who prescribe their medications..TSCL believes this would help boost benefits and keep older women out of poverty, help them to enjoy better health, and contributing to their communities longer. We support legislative remedies like these and will be working to share our survey results in upcoming meetings with Members of Congress..TSCL has been fighting to stop a payroll tax cut for months because of the damage it would do to the Social Security and Medicare trust funds. Last week we contacted both Senate and House leadership in both parties to reinforce our opposition..This issue gets considerable attention from Members of Congress and the media. These findings are a huge red flag that the standard of living of older Americans is eroding, and this is true not only for lower income households, but for all retirees, because healthcare costs are growing much more rapidly than COLAs. To provide greater retirement security, Social Security benefits need to be boosted, and Medicare cost increases need to be slowed in a way that saves billions without cutting benefits. The Senior Citizens League is supporting the Emergency Social Security COLA for 2021 Act, which would replace the 1.3 percent COLA with a more adequate 3 percent COLA in 202How were you affected by healthcare costs in 2020? Please take our TSCL's 2021 Senior Survey..Thus the new formula went into effect almost immediately for most people and is one reason why retirees born over the ten-year period of 1917 through 1926 were affected, not only those covered by the five-year phase-in. In addition, the economy did not perform the way Congress and the Social Security Administration assumed it would under the new benefit formula. Slower than anticipated wage growth, and higher than expected price inflation, resulted in even greater benefit reductions than under original assumptions. These economic conditions persisted for a decade, thus affecting those born over a ten-year period..The Democratic Platform.The deduction is especially important to people age 65 and over, since spending on medical expenses increases with age, and healthcare costs can be considerable. About 23 percent of participants in The Senior Citizens League's 2018 Senior Survey said they routinely itemize medical expenses. A recent report from the non-partisan Kaiser Family Foundation says that Medicare households spent on average ,355 in 2016 on healthcare costs that Medicare doesn't cover. That's equivalent to ,700 in 2018 adjusting for inflation..But the transitional formula failed, and in most cases, the new benefit formula abruptly kicked in. Extreme inflation that climbed to 14.3% in 1980 magnified the disparities. When the benefits are illustrated on a bar graph, they show a deep "V" Notch.