The Social Security Expansion Act (for which Congress.gov has no entry at this writing) would lift the payroll tax cap so that Social Security can tax income over $132,900 into the system. That would allow Social Security to expand the benefits it pays and meet the budgetary shortfalls that might afflict it decades from now should wages never, ever go up again. If your right-wing uncle bellows about liberals always wanting to spend money and never telling you where it comes from, remind him that lifting the payroll tax cap describes exactly where the money's going to come from. If he then objects that rich folks should therefore get six-digit Social Security checks every month when they retire, remind him that Social Security's objective is to ensure that all Americans can retire with dignity, not so that some retirees can buy a new Rolls Royce every month. Social Security Works helps you tell your Congressfolk to help more good Americans retire with dignity by passing the Social Security Expansion Act.
Meanwhile, to my amazement, the Senate has passed S. 47, a giant public lands bill that (among other good works) just so happens to reauthorize the Land and Water Conservation Fund forever, by a staggering 92-8 margin. Let's not go praising the Great God of Bipartisanship, though, because I'm pretty sure the fact that we have been agitating for a more permanent Land and Water Conservation Fund for several years (Congress let it lapse in 2015 and then let it lapse again late last year) has a significant amount to do with the Senate's good work here. So now the bill goes to the House, and you might think it's not a big lift to remind your House Reps that the Land and Water Conservation Fund gave us some of our most iconic public landmarks, but you never really know with these politicians, do you? Someone could get a bee in their bonnet that they can hold this popular bill hostage to some obscure lump of poison they've been trying to enact for years, so the Wilderness Society helps you tell your House Reps to pass S. 47 and protect the Land and Water Conservation Fund forever.
Finally, Sen. Gillibrand has reintroduced S. 463, the FAMILY Act, which would create a national paid family leave program in America -- you know, like the ones nearly every other nation on Earth have! Being without a paid family leave program is not something to shout WE'RE NUMBER ONE!!!! about, after all. The FAMILY Act would provide for 12 weeks of paid family leave for all Americans -- whether it's because they're sick or they need to care for someone in their family who's sick -- and would pay for it with a minuscule payroll tax of four-tenths of one percent, half paid by the worker and half by the employer, such that a person making $50,000 annually would only pay $100 annually toward the program. And if your right-wing uncle says there won't be enough people working to pay into the system to sustain it, remind him to look at the phrase "12 weeks" again; that leaves 40 weeks (and usually more!) to pay into the system. So Moms Rising helps you tell your Congressfolk to support working families by supporting the FAMILY Act.
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