From today’s Fort Worth Star Telegram:

In a few short weeks — conveniently after Election Day — the federal government will be mailing an unwelcome message to affluent retirees: You’ll pay more for Medicare because you earn more.

That rip you see in the retirement safety net is called means-testing. Expect that hole to get bigger as the century unfolds.

Slipped into the 2003 Medicare prescription drug legislation at the last minute by a congressional conference committee, the provision means that wealthier seniors will have to pay a greater share of the cost of doctor visits.
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From Ann Hilton Fisher, Executive Director, AIDS Legal Council of Chicago… She responds to a request from the Chicago Tribune for comment.

“I am delighted to hear that the Tribune editorial board is looking at the new CDC guidelines for HIV testing and counseling.

As I told you, we at the AIDS Legal Council know perhaps better than any other group in the state that HIV is NOT a routine diagnosis analogous, as the CDC suggests, with a cholesterol check. Girls with high cholesterol are not told to use a separate bathroom from their classmates. Women with high cholesterol are not told they can’t get a tattoo. Men with high cholesterol are not told that they can no longer see their regular dentist. Amputee veterans with high cholesterol aren’t told that their doctor won’t debride their stumps. We have seen all these things with an HIV diagnosis. HIV is not a routine diagnosis. A consent to “routine” health care is not a substitute for informed consent to HIV testing.

Here are some additional sources of information.

1. The American Bar Association position–informed consent is key, HIV is not an ordinary diagnosis, makes the analogy to genetic testing.
“The risks and benefits of an HIV test…involve complex physical, emotional, social, and legal consequences, and thus cannot be encompassed by a general medical consent”.
Link here:

2. Statement of regional and national HIV organizations in response to the new guidelines. “We support the routine offer of HIV testing.” “We support CDC’s recommendation that HIV testing remain voluntary and free of coercion.” “We support innovative strategies to expedite counseling and informed written consent to HIV testing.” “We strongly oppose recommendations to eliminate pre-test counseling and written informed consent.”
link here:

3. There are lots of strategies out there that can increase the number of people tested without giving up written informed consent. The summary of some of these strategies was prepared by the AIDS Foundation of Chicago, and although it is still in draft form, I have been told I may share it with the press. http://www.aidschicago.org/pdf/2006/adv_testing_statement.pdf ink here

This article from the San Diego Union describes many of the VA programs covering disability. Often there is overlapping eligibility for Social Security Disability payments, claimants can apply for both.

“The trick is not to wait for a crisis. If your mom or dad is a veteran, I suggest you phone member services at the VA San Diego Healthcare System today to make sure your parent is enrolled with the local VA. At the same time, get a list of programs your parent might be eligible for now or later. If it’s too early to sign up for some of the programs, at least you won’t need to start from scratch when the time comes.”
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This is one man’s story of a nightmare of miscalculated overpayments. A Miami architect tried returning to work after notifying Social Security — and ran into a bureaucratic maze.
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On September 19, the President announced his intention to designate Sylvester J. Schieber to be Chairman of the Social Security Advisory Board (SSAB). The President also intends to nominate Mark J. Warshawsky and Dana K. Bilyeu. Is there a common thread with these three individuals and with the nomination of Michael Astrue to be the new Commissioner?

Note that the President has recently stated that he plans to put “Social Security reform,” which includes private accounts, on his agenda in 2007.

Mr. Schieber is Vice President/U.S. Director of Benefit Consulting at Watson Wyatt Worldwide. He has been on the SSAB since 1998. Notably, he was a member of the 1994-1996 Advisory Council on Social Security, which presented three plans to address the long-range financing of the Social Security trust funds. The plan supported by Mr. Schieber was known as the “Personal Security Account” (PSA) and would transform Social Security into a two-tier benefit. The basic benefit, flat amount would have been about 47% paid to an average worker in 1996, or $410 (in 1996). The second tier would be a personal account that would be financed by shifting 5.0 percentage points of payroll tax and there would be complete freedom to invest in the market. There could be no withdrawal prior to retirement, including no access at the time of disability onset.

Mark Warshawsky was Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy in the U. S. Treasury Department. In this position, he was considered the Department’s top economist. Previously, he was Director of Research at the TIAA-CREF Institute. Many of his speeches, while he was at the Treasury Department, are available on the Internet. In March 2005, he gave a speech on “The Urgency for Social Security Reform in the United States.” This speech leaves little doubt that he supports privatization.

Dana K. Bilyeu is currently the Executive Officer of the Public Employees’ Retirement System of Nevada. She is an attorney and previously served as the System’s legal counsel in the Nevada Attorney General’s Office.

Mr. Schieber does not need any further confirmation. However, as new SSAB members, Mr. Warshawsky and Ms. Bilyeu will need to go through the Senate confirmation process.

Bruce Borden had it all at 36. A self-made man of means and influence, he was a prosperous entrepreneur, an insulation contractor and landlord, on track to an early retirement.

Bruce Borden wants Social Security reformed so that people with disabilities can earn more but keep benefits by paying into the system.

Then he became paralyzed in a diving accident and lost it all.

But what Borden has accomplished since has surpassed even his earlier success. So when he talks about reforming Social Security for millions of Americans with disabilities, you believe he can do it.

His plan, dubbed Making Work Pay, is getting attention in Madison and Washington. It would let people with significant disabilities earn what they can and pay for the public assistance they need to keep them working and independent. It’s a flip from the current system through which people who are trying to make a living risk losing the very supports they need to stay independent.

“It’s just not right that all these employment barriers for people with disabilities exist, and we can’t go to work and contribute to our needs without being penalized,” Borden said. “Right now, we’re paying people with disabilities not to work. Why don’t we support them to go to work and pay back into the system?”

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From today’s Los Angeles Times:

Social Security privatization is not just unlikely to succeed, for various reasons that are subject to discussion. It is mathematically certain to fail. Discussion is pointless.

The usual case against privatization is that (1) millions of inexperienced investors may end up worse off, and (2) stocks don’t necessarily do better than bonds over the long run, as proponents assume. But privatization won’t work for a better reason: It can’t possibly work, even in theory.

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America’s private pension system is now in crisis. Over the past few years, American taxpayers have been put at risk of assuming tens of billions of dollars of pension liabilities from once profitable companies. Hundreds of thousands of retired steelworkers and airline employees have seen health-care benefits that were promised to them by their employers vanish. General Motors, the country’s largest automaker, is between forty and fifty billion dollars behind in the money it needs to fulfill its health-care and pension promises.

This crisis is sometimes portrayed as the result of corporate America’s excessive generosity in making promises to its workers. But when it comes to retirement, health, disability, and unemployment benefits there is nothing exceptional about the United States: it is average among industrialized countries—more generous than Australia, Canada, Ireland, and Italy, just behind Finland and the United Kingdom, and on a par with the Netherlands and Denmark.

The difference is that in most countries the government, or large groups of companies, provides pensions and health insurance.

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Whether you receive Social Security retirement, disability or survivor benefits, free and secure online services are available at the Social Security Web site, www.socialsecurity.gov, for your use.

Included are ways for you to request a letter verifying your benefit amount, to replace a lost Medicare care, and even to change your address or telephone number on your SSA record.
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From the Trenton Times: In applying for benefits, complications can work to your advantage. One of the questions on a Social Security retirement claim asks if you have recently been unable to work because of a disability. The government isn’t just trying to be nice by finding out how you’ve been feeling lately. That is a leading question that’s intended to find out if you are eligible for Social Security disability benefits.

If you are applying for early (i.e., reduced) retirement benefits, there is a big advantage to getting disability benefits instead. Social Security disability benefits pay the same rate as full retirement benefits.

For example, my wife is 62 and will receive a reduced retirement benefit that is a little less than 80 percent of her full benefit amount. However, had she been disabled and entitled to Social Security disability benefits, she would have received her full 100 percent retirement benefit. (You must have a severe disability that’s expected to last a year or longer in order to qualify for the higher disability rate.)

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