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This week, TSCL saw support grow for three bills in the House and one bill in the Senate. First, two new cosponsors signed on to the bipartisan CREATES Act of 2017, bringing the total up to nine. The new cosponsors are Representative Carol Shea-Porter and Representative Francis Rooney. If signed into law, the bill would increase competition in the prescription drug industry by encouraging generic and biosimilar drug manufacturers to introduce their products to the market more quickly..The Social Security Trustees recently projected that the Disability Insurance Trust Fund will be fully depleted by 201If the next Congress takes no action to address the matter, payroll taxes will only be sufficient to cover about 80 percent of benefits after Trust Fund depletion. While Congress has never permitted a trust fund to run out before, time is short to make what's likely to be difficult long-term changes. "The longer lawmakers wait at this point, the greater the chances of a funding crisis and benefit cuts," Cates says..The program will ship roughly one million doses per week to about 6,500 pharmacies across the U.S. as a trial run, beginning Feb. 1They also will boost shipments to states by 5% to 10.5 million doses per week, up from the 10 million doses that were announced a week earlier..And there is this report from Vox News:.The letter and the fact sheet leave out the most important part of the calculation - the additional lifetime income that one could expect to receive over a 20 30 year retirement, if one delays benefits up to age 70. That can add up to tens of thousands of dollars if you are in reasonably good health. In fact, Social Security's publications tend to imply that people get about the same amount of benefits if they start benefits early because they receive the reduced benefit over a longer period of time. That isn't necessarily the case..Despite resistance from some lawmakers, appropriators in the House and Senate say that their work on the "cromnibus" is continuing. According to Harold Rogers, Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, negotiations are "on schedule," and the bill should come to the floor by early next week. If it fails to get the necessary votes, lawmakers will likely adopt a continuing resolution to provide the government with short-term funding. At this point, leaders are saying that a government shutdown is not something that they're willing to consider..Interest rates fell. Seven percent of Social Security financing comes from the interest earned by the assets held by the Social Security Trust Funds. Those assets are actually non-marketable government bonds, like I.O.U.s from the U.S. Treasury payable to the Social Security Trust Fund. That income stream was reduced because short term interest rates dropped to extreme lows during 2020 and so far in 2021..He said it is still possible that legislation regarding those issues could be passed, but not very likely. He said he was afraid they would be caught up in the elections and be used as campaign issues rather than being seriously considered for passage. That means that if any action is taken it will probably not be until later in November or even December, depending on how late in the year Congress works..Individuals with incomes above ,000, or couples with incomes above 0,000.