captioning performed by vitac the national committee to preserve social security and medicare released a report today on women and social security. it finds the poverty rate for

senior women and whiidows is 50 higher than males. the organization has proposed changes for how benefits are calculated. this is just over an hour. >> good morning, everybody. could i ask you to turn your cell phones off? c-span has made that request. or ipads or whatever else is going to make noise. my name is max richtman, i'm the president of the national committee to preserve social security. we are a member-supported advocacy educational organization that for 30 years has been committed to protecting and promoting the health and income security of older americans and their families. i want to welcome one of our board members, bill vaughn, who is here today.

thank you for coming. and i also, before we start, would like to thank congressman john conyers for helping us get this room for this important briefing. and more importantly, for the leadership that he's shown for so many years and continues to show in protecting social security, medicare, and medicaid. we need congressman conyers to be here to do the things he's done so well for so many years. i want to thank everyone for being here this morning. the national committee has joined the national organization for women's foundation, the institute for women's policy research to release a report that we believe is important not just to our various constituencies, but to the entire country. breaking the social security glass ceiling, our report

provides a desperately-needed reality check to a washington debate that increasingly and almost exclusively addresses social security in terms of how much money can be saved by cutting what are already very modest benefits. rather than what those benefit cuts would actually mean to the average american. the truth is as our country ages and retirement income continues to decline for millions of americans, congress should be talking about the adequacy of social security benefits, not talking about cutting them. congress should examine the inequities that have created a poverty rate for senior women and widows that is 50% higher -- it's really an astounding number -- 50% higher for female retirees.

we have to break the glass ceiling if we're going to preserve the economic security of generations of american women and their families. let me also, i saw scott frye here. he's here. he's the deputy commissioner for legislation, and of course, thank you so much caroline coleman for coming. she's the deputy social security commissioner. appreciate you being here. we are very honored to open this briefing and hear congresswoman eleanor holmes norton. she joins us this morning. the congresswoman understands the challenges facing retirees, especially women retirees, and elder women of color. she has been, as we all know, a tireless champion of equality and equity for civil rights.

the issues addressed in our report that we're releasing this morning speak to exactly the kind of fairness she's championed throughout her distinguished career. we're very honored to have you here congresswoman. please welcome the congresswoman. [ applause ] >> thank you very much. this briefing should be particularly welcomed in the halls of the congress. its a beautiful cover and a very readable report. it's not like your government reports. it's a report meant to be read not only by members of congress, but by the larger public.

a public that is increasingly female that needs to focus on social security. so i want to thank the three organizations who are responsible for this report. the national committee to preserve social security and medicare, the national organization of women, and the institute for women's policy research. a symbol here to give you a briefing is a lot of expertise that i think all of us will find enlightening. particularly since the social security system, as we know it, is still about yesterday's workforce. the genius of the system is that it has lasted so well and so long and is the most beloved of federal programs. yet even the best federal

programs come to a point, and social security to me seems to be past that point, where one has to look at what it's today challenges are. the great challenge of the feminist movement was all on the front end of the workforce. women's work life, especially as some women were getting a work life for the first time in the post-world war ii generation, the kinds of work still a seminal issue because the sex segregation in the workforce spills out finally at the end of a woman's work life when she comes to social security and other ways of living out her life with some comfort, and then of course, the payout, which at the front end of the workforce has always fascinated women and

been a driver of the changes they want. the fascination with opening up men's jobs, for example, to women has had a fair amount of success. you see the doctors and lawyers and the rest of them. but what i think is important about this report is that it focuses on the mainstream woman, the average woman, the working woman who may be single or married, but also increasingly today because of the longevity of women in particular but also of men, has responsibility for ageing parents or relatives. her own life is even longer.

divorce or widowhood is almost inevitable for most women. and so the smaller salaries result in smaller retirement and smaller savings. for women of color, of course, they are but a prototype of these women. they stand out only because they emphasize the disparities that this report seeks to cure because they are most likely not to have pensions or even 401ks. even after a life of hard work. so that i think the report's focus on what most people think

of social security today have not focused upon is extremely important. and i want to say, as the president has indicated that he supports same-sex marriage this week, that i'm pleased that the report also does not leave out any who will be affected or should be affected by changes in social security. finally, let me say i hope that as you hear this briefing today you are not deterred by the tone of the congress or what is happening in the congress now. i remind you that the social security system itself is an innovation that came out of great crisis. that the generation that created the system and is responsible for those innovations decided

not just to fix the depression, but to fix the economy and to assure security long after the depression and indeed they have. it is an extraordinary tribute to the innovation that came out of tough times. so i suggest that we look at this report in light of the innovations that are also possible and not let the congress stop us. make the congress do the right thing. thank you very much for coming today. [ applause ] >> thank you so much. we couldn't be more pleased to join in presenting this report with the national organization for women and the institute for

women's policy research. heidi hartman and terry o'neill have spent a lot of time, as we have, as our great staff, especially web phillips, have committed a lot of time and energy to producing this document. so i'm going to first introduce dr. carol estes who is chair of the foundation. she's a professor of sociology at the university of california san francisco. she's the founding and former director of the institute of health and aging, former chair of the department of social and behavioral sciences, school of nursing ucfs. she's a member of the institute of medicine, of the national academy of sciences, and past

president of the gerontological society of america, the american society on ageing and the association of gerontology and higher education. she's also served as a consultant to u.s. commissioner of social security and has worked with the u.s. and house and senate committees on aging. and she is my boss. dr. estes. [ applause ] >> thank you. i want to acknowledge and thank congresswoman eleanor holmes norton for your inspirational work and leadership and particularly for your comments this morning and your support. this report that we are presenting today is an urgent call for our retirement system to catch up with the changing

needs of women and their families. building on what works, the report offers a modernization plan for social security that would break the glass ceiling by strengthening benefits for women and improving the adequacy of social security in light of the very difficult economic plight of women across america and lives fraught with risk in all walks of life. the report examines the paradox of women's increasing role in the workforce while they find themselves economically vulnerable in old age. womens' lifetime of juggling paid work in the labor market with unpaid work of family care giving means that women have less opportunity than men to accumulate assets across their life span.

interrupted employment patterns with periods of full and part-time work punctuated by time out of the paid labor market is a recipe for low wages, few fringe benefits, and fewer assets in old age. despite women's increased labor force participation, women earn 19% less than men. for women of color, wage disparities are even greater. with little if any access to private pension coverage and lower amounts when provided. family responsibilities crowd out opportunities to work and to pay and to save. older women of color are most vulnerable, even with social security older hispanics and african-americans experience double the poverty rates. compounding their financial difficulties, women live longer, have more chronic illness and

high out of pocket health costs. throughout their lives, black and hispanic women tend to have lower educational achievement, higher unemployment, lower wages and greater care giving responsibilities for the young and increasingly grandchildren and the frail elderly. the disparity in income under social security by sex is clear. men make approximately $15,620 while women's average income is $12,155. nevertheless, social security is the most important source of income for older women. it is a vital lifeline for all americans that represents 90% of the income of more than a third of retired americans.

this report speaks to why race and ethnicity must be a factor in social security reform. social security provides 90% of the annual incomes of more than half of hispanics and almost half of african-americans. the differences by race and ethnicity are even more pronounced when we take into account marriage and living arrangement. fewer market and marriage-based resources make older women particularly dependent on social security. among unmarried women of color, 58% rely on social security for 90% or more of their total income. the american people correctly understand that they have paid into social security all their working lives and that they have earned their benefits. consistently over its history,

national polls favor universal old-age programs and think the u.s. should be doing more for the elderly. it's more than 70% in the most recent polls crossing party lines and age lines. the crisis is not in social security, but the private system that has failed to provide a foundation for income security and old age. the great recession of 2008, crashing stocks, home values, 401(k)s, and next zero interest rates on savings have demonstrated the grave risk we bare if we do not improve the universal risk pool of social insurance that we have earned through social security. while fiscal hawks hope to use social security for deficit reduction, we offer a modernization plan that would strengthen benefits for women

and their families while improving equity and adequacy for generations of americans. our nation cannot afford not to provide fair and adequate benefits for future generations of working americans. social security is a family program. it is for families, not just elders. it pays more benefits to children than any other federal program through their coverage in the event of death or disability of a caregiver. for veterans returning from iraq and afghanistan, disabled and for those killed in war, social security is a vital lifeline for their children and their spouses who raise them. this was the case of the 9/11 twin towers terrorist attack. there were about 2600 children who received their first social security check within 30 days of

of that disastrous event and the death of their working parent. social security not only is good for the american people, it's good for the american economy. it pours more than $725 billion at last count into the nation through individual beneficiary payments. this money is spent on necessities and contributes to our communities and neighborhoods. that is $1 billion in the district of columbia each year. more than $12 billion in maryland and $18 billion in virginia for those close to home here. the reality is that social security needs to be protected and strengthened. it is a practical means of protecting all ages at various points in our lives. thank you.

[ applause ] >> thank you, carol. before i introduce our next speaker, scott frye had to step out when we opened, and i want to acknowledge his presence. scott is the deputy commissioner in social security in the office of legislation and congressional affairs. thank you so much for coming. our next presenter is heidi hartman. dr. hartman is the president of the washington based institute for women's policy research, an organization she formed in 1987 to meet the need for women-centered policy oriented research. she's an economist and also a research professor at the george washington university and holds a ph.d. from yale university. dr. hartman has published numerous articles and journals and books, and her work has been

transmitted into more than one dozen languages. she offer lectures on women, economics, policy, including social security and retirement, and has frequently testified before the u.s. congress and is often cited as an authority in various media outlets such as cnn news and "the washington post" and "the new york times." in 1994 dr. hartman was the recipient of a mcarthur fellowship for her work in the field of women and economics. for those who aren't familiar with that award, it is a very, very special award. so thank you, heidi, for being here. [ applause ] >> good morning, everyone. i want to thank the national committee to preserve and now

being our co-conspirators in this project. it's been a wonderful way to get out some of the issues we have all been working on for so long and finally this has come to fruition. we're very, very pleased that this day is here. the women's movement, as terry will talk about, has been talking about ways to modernize and improve social security for a very long time. i see some young people in the audience. i want you to know that you are entitled to benefits as a worker. but as carol explained, you are also entitled to benefits as a spouse. and the old days, it used to be that men always earned more than women, so it was mostly the women who took advantage of the spousal benefits. but as we have been hearing in the news, there's some women who out earn men. so men may be taking advantage of spousal benefits in the future. if your wife or future wife out earn you.

and if you do marry, i would urge you not to get divorced for ten years no matter what else happens because you do not know what will happen in the future and perhaps that acts that you can't stand now may wind up doing very, very well economically and you may have an economic problem. then you will have the insurance of having benefits from that former spouse. so keep that in mind. and you can't divorce them, make up, remarry. no. it has to be ten years at a time. if you remarry, the second time has to be for ten years at a time. these are important life lessons. i would like everyone to know these things. it's the most important thing you can know about social security. so for women and men, you do have access to these benefits two ways. and for most women today who are retired, they took advantage of the spousal benefit. that's equal to 50% of their husband's benefit. he's retired. he's getting 100% of his benefit. whatever it is. let's say it's $2,000 a month. that means she's getting $1,000

a month in retirement benefits. when he dies, she can take his full benefit, but she has to give up the spousal benefit. so now she will be living on $2,000 a month where before they were living together on $3,000. and so our first benefit improvement proposal i'll be talking about our proposals for improvements is to say that the surviving spouse should have 75% of what the couple had together. you can see from my example that that surviving spouse would have lost 33% of the couple's income. if we go to a rule of 75% of the couple's income, then the most any spouse will lose is 25% when the former spouse dies. this applies to divorced spouses as well. if you had a ten-year marriage, let's say you had several ten-year marriages. say to several different men when you're a woman. when you retire, you can pick the one that earned the most and you'll get those benefits. you can't pick all three. that's a problem. but you can get the benefit from the one who earned the most.

this applies to a divorced woman whose ex-spouse dies. if you were a dual earner, which is more and more the case, you were each earning $2,000 based on a long lifetime of work. and one dies. instead of having $4,000 together, you'd have only $2,000. the research shows you need about 80% of what you had together. so with this proposal, 75% of the joint benefits you'd be able to keep more of what your former spouse or current spouse was getting in benefits as well as yourself. we did maximize it, put a cap on it for average earning. so they wouldn't get quite that much. but in general for people who are low and moderate income, they would be able to keep 75% of the joint benefits. that's a very important improvement for all people who either are married at the time of retirement and widowhood or were formerly married for a ten-year marriage.

one of the reasons spousal benefits are so important to women is that it's based on 35 years of work. your highest 35 years of earnings. that's a lot of years of work. especially for women who have taken time out to raise families. so that's one reason the spousal benefit is so important to women. one of the things we want to do in our second benefit improvement is improve your work credits if you are a caregiver. let's say you are married and take a lot of time out of the workforce because of raising children or for elder care. now your own worker record is depleted because you were earning less because of the care giving. so our proposal here is to assign an amount of money half the median wage, which would be $22,000 in 2011. that's $22,000, that's half the wage. you'd get five years of that earnings on your earnings record. it's something that would be put on there. this is called a care giving credit.

it would also be done for those who care for the disabled or elderly who need special attention. frail elderly. and this would help a man or a woman who does care giving to build up their worker credit, even though they weren't able to work as much as they would have. had they not been doing caregiving. this would help not only married workers, but single women. many women have children without the benefit of marriage or the disadvantage of marriage. sometimes it can be one or the other. you never know. which often when you first get into it. and so this would help single women as well as married women. and men as well as women. so this is a very far-reaching proposal. some of these things sound pointy headed, but they are quite far reaching. this is one of those that's especially far reaching. it's a new alternative. now there's also a special minimum. this was designed to help low-wage workers. if you worked a low wage, your benefit might be very small.

if you earned $12,000 a year for 30 years, you can get a fabulous benefit of $795 a month now. and that's not even the poverty level. so our proposal is to increase that minimum benefit up to $1,400 a month. we would be almost doubling it and you would have to have 30 years to get that full value but with ten years you would get something. to this minimum, we also want to add care giving credit years. we would add ten years. this would mean if you had no work history at all, but did provide care giving for ten years, you'd be able to get this minimum benefit. it would be $400 a month. that could be very important to some retired people. so this again is far reaching. it's an improvement of an existing system by making it more generous and adding care giving credits, we're adding something new to that provision that wasn't there before.