GBO NEWS: The 1%’s Other Tax Escape; Will Paul Ryan Steal Your Security?; Coughlin’s “Longevity Economy”; Mexico’s Med Tourism (Forget the Wall), Villages, Elder Fraud; & MORE
GENERATIONS BEAT ONLINE NEWS
E-News of the Journalists Network on Generations — Our 25th Year.
January 11, 2018 — Volume 18, Number 1
EDITOR’S NOTE: GBONews, e-news of the Journalists Network on Generations (JNG), publishes alerts for journalists, producers and authors covering generational issues. Send your news of important stories or books (by you and others), fellowships, awards or pertinent kvetches to GBO News Editor Paul Kleyman. [paul.kleyman@earthlink.net]. To subscribe to GBONews.org at no charge, simply sending a request to Paul with your name, address, phone number and editorial affiliation or note that you freelance. For each issue, you’ll receive the table of contents in an e-mail, so just click through to the full issue at www.gbonews.org. GBONews does not provide its list to other entities.
In This Issue: Starting Our 25th Year–Very Stable; Still Working on the Genius.
1. FISCAL REFORM SCHOOL: *** “Who Is Finished Paying Their 2018 Social Security Taxes? Probably Not You,” by Teresa Ghilarducci, PhD, Huffington Post; *** “Paul Ryan Place the Nail in Trump’s Faux Populism,” by T.A. Frank, the Vanity Fair Hive;“Trump’s HHS Nom Endorses Bill That Would Lead To Dramatic Medicaid Cuts.” by Alice Ollstein, Talking Points Memo; *** Newly Minted U.S. Senators Doug Jones, Alabama, and Tina Smith, Minnesota, on “HELP” Committee; Jones also on Aging.
2. THE BOOKMOBILE: *** Happiness Is a Choice You Make: Lessons from A Year Among the Oldest Old, by the New York Times’ John Leland, set for Jan. 23 Release; *** The Longevity Economy: Unlocking the World’s Fastest-Growing, Most Misunderstood Market, by Joseph F. Coughlin, PhD.
3. THE STORYBOARD:
*** TWO NPR SERIES — Ina Jaffe’s Four-Parter on the Senior Village Movement;
*** “Abused and Betrayed,” Joseph Shapiro’s current series on the “epidemic” of sexual abuse against people with intellectual disabilities.
*** “Elder Fraud: Senior Swindles, Both by Relatives and Others, Are on the Rise,” by Gary Rotstein, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette;
*** Beth Baker’s three-part series on innovative intergenerational programs for PBS Next Avenue;
*** Kent Paterson’s Medical-Dental Tourism Series — “New Mexicans Trek South of the Border for Dental Care in Palomas” and “Will Juárez and Mexico Be an Escape Valve for the U.S. Health Care Crisis?” New Mexico Politics (NMPolitics.net);
*** “Filipino Caregivers Battle Lack of Sleep, Other Work Risks,” by Neil Gonzales, Philippine News.
1. FISCAL REFORM SCHOOL
*** “Who Is Finished Paying Their 2018 Social Security Taxes? Probably Not You,” by Teresa Ghilarducci, PhD, Huffington Post (Jan. 4): An economics professor at The New School for Social Research in New York, Ghilarducci calculated that the highest earners in America stopped paying the FICA payroll tax before January 7, 2018. For example, according to Business Insider, she notes, “The top-paid executive at Charter Communication (he makes $98 million a year and got a 500% raise last year) stopped paying by noon on January 1, right about when the ibuprofen kicked in to nurse New Year’s Eve hangovers. The CEO of CBS earned $68 million last year, a 22% raise from the year before, and will stop paying FICA tax by your first day back at work on January 2 (if you aren’t among the millions working on the New Year’s Day).”
Ghilarducci reminds us, “We pay for Social Security benefits by paying the FICA tax, which is 12.4% of earnings split evenly between the employer and the employee up to a 2018 cap of $128,400. Ninety-five percent of us will pay FICA all year long because our annual earnings fall below the cap.” (She doesn’t mention that freelancers, which the law considers to be among the elevated class of the “self-employed,” pay the full fare on both sides of the “split.”) She adds, “People earning the highest salaries (the top 1% is about 133,000 people earning an average of $2.5 million per year) pay into Social Security as if they only earn $128,400 per year. Their Social Security benefits are also calculated as if they make only that amount. Every year, this cap means that over $2 trillion dollars of earnings escapes Social Security tax.”
The good news, she explains, is that “Social Security is in good shape and well-funded. However, the program will only have enough money to pay three-quarters of benefits in 2027 unless the system obtains about $300-$340 billion per year starting in 2028 or a cool trillion now, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. To benchmark what $300 billion means, the President and Congressional Republicans passed an unpopular tax bill that cut federal revenue by over four times what Social Security needs – by 2028, 83% of the $1.5 trillion tax cut will go to the top 1% of taxpayers.”
Ghilarducci offers several remedies, among them lifting the cap, so the 1% would add $300,000 to their annual FICA tax. She goes on, though, “The richest people in America would not lose their social status or economic well-being.” She also recommends collecting on income the Social Security currently does not counted as taxable wages. She writes, “The richest 20 Americans – including four members of the Mars candy family members and three Waltons [Wal-Mart heirs] — likely earn at least 6% per year in dividends, interest, and capital gains on their wealth, or $45 billion. The lowest 21 million earners also earned $45 billion.”
Hey, could you hand me that Mars bar? On second thought, please just pass the ibuprofen.
*** “Paul Ryan Place the Nail in Trump’s Faux Populism,” by T.A. Frank, the Vanity Fair “Hive” (Jan. 5): It’s ba-a-ack! Frank writes, “Even in the warmest of times, a president must bring tactical delicacy to his dealings with Congress. Readers of Michael Wolff’s new book, Fire and Fury, which depicts the White House as the playpen of a maniac, will have to judge for themselves if Donald Trump is pulling off such subtleties. In the meantime, what do you do if you’re Paul Ryan? What you’ve already been doing: praying for the rise of Mike Pence and working on what inspires you. Some of us love painting or ballet dancing. Paul Ryan loves entitlement reform.”
Frank reminds readers. “Trump vowed during his campaign not to touch entitlements, and back in 2011 he described Paul Ryan’s efforts to cut Medicare as a “death wish.” Voters don’t like entitlement cuts. Mitch McConnell doesn’t want them. Ryan has already helped to lead his party to disaster with them. He helped lead an effort in 2005 to partially privatize Social Security, and the midterm elections that followed, while never auspicious for Republicans to begin with, brought Republican reversals even bigger than people had expected, flipping the House back to the Democrats.”
The blog continues, “Ryan is undoubtedly hopeful that he can prevent elderly rage by sparing anyone over, say, 40 from the cuts. When you’re young, you’re likelier to think you’ll be so rich when old that you won’t need a government payout anyway.” In addition, Frank goes on,
“…Even if Trump takes a hard line on immigration negotiations and allows DACA, or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, to expire, it’s better for Ryan if there’s some other issue to command the spotlight. Plus, people believe Ryan is planning his departure from Congress this year anyway.”
*** On the Other Hand—“Republicans Scale Down Agenda for Safety-Net Programs, Health Law”: The Wall Street Journal’s Kristina Peterson and Stephanie Armour reported this Tuesday (Jan. 9), “Republicans are scaling back their ambitions to overhaul safety-net programs and dismantle the Affordable Care Act following President Donald Trump’s weekend retreat with GOP leaders, due to concerns they can’t muster enough support ahead of the 2018 midterm elections. Instead, Republican lawmakers are likely to embrace a slimmed-down agenda focused on the basics, including funding the government, raising the government debt limit and striking a deal on immigration, according to GOP lawmakers and aides.”
The story continues, “House Speaker Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) last year mentioned ambitious plans to tackle government assistance programs, including food stamps and other programs tied to income, that he says discourage recipients from working. But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) has warned in recent days that he has little interest in pursuing a partisan overhaul in a chamber where Republicans hold a narrow 51-49 majority. After meeting with GOP leaders at Camp David, Mr. Trump appeared more aligned with Mr. McConnell, saying Republicans would look at whether discrete changes to safety-net programs could attract Democratic support. ‘Otherwise we’ll be holding it for a little bit later,’ he said.”
*** Then Again: Talking Points Memo reported, also on Tuesday, “Trump’s HHS Nom Endorses Bill That Would Lead To Dramatic Medicaid Cuts.”
TPM reporter Alice Ollstein wrote that the president’s nominee to head the Department of Health and Human Services, former pharmaceutical executive Alex Azar, said during his confirmation hearing that he supports the Graham-Cassidy bill, which Congress failed to pass recently and which would have repealed much of the Affordable Care Act and converted federal funding for both Medicaid and Obamacare’s marketplaces into block grants, which would dwindle over time.”
Ollstein added, “In an exchange with Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), Azar disputed that
Graham-Cassidy would cut billions in funding for Medicaid and insurance subsidies for low-income patients. ‘Slowing the rate of growth is not a cut, in my mind or the president’s mind,’ he said.” Seniors and their families who would likely their long-term care access greatly cut, of course, would surely appreciate these men’s very smart minds. With Azar’s expected confirmation, don’t expect attempts to block-grant Medicaid to fade much beyond the mid-term elections in November.
*** Senate HELP Is on the Way: Newly minted U.S. Senators Doug Jones, Alabama, and Tina Smith, Minnesota, have been assigned to that body’s Health, Education, Labor and Pension (HELP) Committee. In addition, Jones will sit on the Senate Special Committee on Aging. Had Roy Moore won in Alabama last month, one might guess he’d have passed on the aging committee. But how about that education one? Would Moore has said, ”Me, too”?
2. THE BOOKMOBILE
*** Happy Lessons from the Oldest Old: The new book by the New York Times’ John Leland, Happiness Is a Choice You Make: Lessons from A Year Among the Oldest Old, which we mentioned a few issues back, is set for release Jan. 23. The book brings together his profiles of six diverse New York City seniors, ages 85-plus, whose lives he followed throughout 2015. NYT ran Leland’s update on his subjects, with two having died in the past year, on Dec. 29, “Want to Be Happy? Think Like an Old Person.”
More worth noting here, though, is his reflective “Inside the Times” essay on Jan. 3, “When Old News Is Good News: The Effect of 6 Elderly New Yorkers on One Middle-Aged Reporter.” Leland, wrote, “For almost three years, my mother has been asking me the same question. Don’t I get depressed, she wants to know, talking to all those old people? The short answer is no. The slightly longer answer is that no work I have ever done has brought me as much joy and hope, or changed my outlook on life as profoundly. Even now, I am surprised to be writing those words.”
He continued, “The six lived in nursing homes or walk-up apartments; they played mah-jongg or listened to opera or made scratchy independent movies. One found new love in old age; one said at every interview that he wanted to die. All six had beaten the odds just by living that long. At the beginning of 2018, having just revisited them, I can say that four are still beating them.”
On Leland’s initial speaker swing in January and February (with other dates to be scheduled around the country), publisher, Sarah Crichton Books (Farrar, Straus, Giroux) has him at:
Jan. 23—Barnes & Noble, 2289 Broadway (82nd Street), NYC, 7 p.m.
Jan. 25—Brooklyn Historical Society, 128 Pierrepont Street, at 6:30 p.m.
Jan. 29—Politics & Prose in Washington, D.C., 5015 Connecticut Ave NW, at 7 p.m.
Feb. 21—Malaprops, Asheville, N.C., 55 Haywood Street, 6 p.m.
Feb. 22—Park Road Books, Charlotte, N.C., 4139 Park Road, at 7 p.m.
For a media review copy and information on Leland’s other appearances, contact Caroline Zavakos: caroline.zavakos@fsgbooks.com; phone: 212-206-5227.
*** The Longevity Economy: Unlocking the World’s Fastest-Growing, Most Misunderstood Market, by Joseph F. Coughlin, PhD (Public Affairs/Hachette Group): Among all of the books chugging along in publishing’s delivery vans, every so often one deserves express tracking to your door. Joe Couglin is not one of the typical business authors offering yet another GPS to entrepreneurial success.
Coughlin is founder and director of the MIT AgeLab, a multidisciplinary research program examining the role of technology in the lives of the 50-plus population. He and his crew have long worked to divine useful innovations to improve the quality of life for older adults and their families. More than pencil out the market trillions to be tapped, though, Couglin provides a rich critique of the profoundly negative narrative of aging that permeates our culture. The effect is to undermine not only lucrative business opportunities, but also drown the productive bonuses of longevity—including more purposeful lives—in one miserable “tsunami” of misidentified old-age “burden” after another.
Far more expansively than a mere market analysis, Coughlin adds this book to the literature of longevity and the penetrating impact in nearly every corner of American culture in a world rapidly growing older. He writes, “The problem is our very idea of old age, which is socially constructed, historically contingent, and deeply flawed—as falsely defined as a pull-to-open door with a ‘push’ sign on it.”
Coughlin explains, “Oldness, in this misleading definition, is bad. Any disinterested reading of the facts would suggest otherwise: older populations are a good thing, the natural result when societies keep their members healthy, out of danger, educated, and in command of their reproductive rights. And yet, there is an overwhelming tendency to view old age and the aging of populations as a slowly unfolding crisis. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen the aging of one group or another—nations, workforces, the entire world—referred to as a ‘ticking time bomb.’”
He continues, “Dig into this sort of age-fearing literature, and you’ll quickly discover that the growing older population is up there with planet-killing asteroids and nuclear war as one of the great threats to the human race. You’ll soon learn that Social Security (or the equivalent pension scheme outside the United States) will fail, medical care will become too expensive for societies to manage, taxes will double or triple before today’s kids reach middle age, and the baby boomers will spend their later years surviving on cat food because they haven’t saved enough for retirement.”
Unlike the typical Pollyannaish positivity of less studied advocates of the “mature market,” Coughlin, while he describes encouraging trends and innovations to be gleaned by a smarter business and design world, warns of a more genuine threat to our future: widening economic inequality.
He writes, “All told, we are staring at a possible future in which the gift of extra years of life is diverted straight to the wealthiest people in the world, while those less fortunate get sick and die earlier—sometimes far earlier.” The book goes on to detail “many things that can be done to reverse this course”—to the extent that our society and leaders can recognize the ageism permeating this culture’s framing of old age as an inevitable burden.”
For a review copy (hard copy of e-version), and press information, journalists can contact Jaime Leifer, at 212-364-0684; jaime.leifer@hbgusa.com.
3. THE STORYBOARD
*** NPR’s Two Powerful Series: Kudos first to Ina Jaffe for her four-part series on the senior-villages, which ran Dec. 12-15. You can listen or read the transcripts on Jaffe’s archive page. As briefly noted at the top of the first segment, “The so-called ‘village movement’ coordinates crucial services for the elderly, allowing many to age in their homes. It’s now expanded to 200 spots around the U.S., as advocates adapt the model to different communities.” After the initial overview, Jaffe went to south Chicago to look at how activists are trying to adapt the 17-year-old village effort to poorer, minority communities. Part 3 examines how the Village model is being adapted to rural areas, such as in Plumas County in northern California. And the series wrapped up with an overview of the movement, including a map showing where to find them.
*** “Abused and Betrayed” is the title of Joseph Shapiro’s deeply disturbing series running this week on the alarming “epidemic” of sexual abuse against people with intellectual disabilities. Although the year-long project of NPR’s Investigations is not expressly on aging, it’s not surprising that so many of the victims in this story, typically women unable to speak for themselves, are 58, 66 and of other midlife and older ages. Shapiro, who’s fine reporting on long-term care and disability dates back to his years at U.S. News & World Report, and the reporting time found, in part:
- People with intellectual disabilities are sexually assaulted at a rate seven times higher than those without disabilities, according to the Justice Department’s unpublished crime data.
- Predators target people with intellectual disabilities because they know they are easily manipulated and will have difficulty testifying later. These crimes go mostly unrecognized, unprosecuted and unpunished. And the abuser is free to abuse again.
- Police and prosecutors are often reluctant to take these cases because they are difficult to win in court.
As we’ve often noted, GBONews.org and its generator, the Journalists Network on Generations, is continuing our collaborative Journalists Fellows in Aging program with The Gerontological Society of America (GSA). Now in its eighth year, the program has included a total of 136 working journalists from both mainstream and ethnic media. Each reporter in this year’s group attended the GSA-hosted World Congress of Gerontology and Geriatrics last summer in San Francisco, including a special training program for the fellows, and have been publishing or broadcasting their proposed series or stories on a wide range of issues in aging.
Here are the most recent postings:
*** INTERGENERATIONAL INNOVCATIONS SERIES — Part 1 –“Public School in a Nursing Home Benefits Young and Old,” by Beth Baker, PBS Next Avenue (Dec. 1, 2017). At Grace Living Center in Jenks, Okla., the nursing home’s residents share space with kindergarteners and pre-K youngsters from a local public school, whose classrooms are inside the nursing home. Although a number of nursing homes have onsite child care centers, it is rare for a public school to have such a partnership.
Part 2 — “New York City Program Brings Generations Together” (cross-posted by Diverse Elders Coalition (Jan. 8, 2018): New York City’s DOROT (Hebrew for “Generations”) has developed innovative programs to connect older and younger people in meaningful ways that combat elders’ isolation. DOROT social workers look for commonalities between individuals, whether a shared interest or similar background. For instance, Ramon Couzon, 78, shared the painful story of his wife’s death and his unwillingness to let her go. “When I got with Vera, I needed to learn how to live again,” Couzon said. “What do I do for an encore? Now I dig deep within myself and find peace through her tutorship.” Volunteer Vera Ruangtragool, 34, added that the relationship has helped her as well. “It allows me to have a more complete view of the human experience,” she said.
Part 3 — “Intergenerational Programs Thrive in Rural Minnesota,” (Jan. 4, 2018): An award-winning intergenerational program in rural Minnesota called AGE to age has programs in 16 communities, including three Native American Indian reservations. All but one of the communities (Hibbing, with 25,000 people) are rural, ranging in population from 300 to 2,000. Many of the localities lack even a senior center. And young adults often move for better jobs, leaving grandparents far from their grandchildren. “AGE to age is filling a great need, especially for older adults, as far as reducing isolation,” said Lynn Haglin, vice president of program sponsor, the Northland Foundation. Fond du Lac Reservation AGE to age, for example, draws all ages to take part in traditional practices such as ricing, sugarbushing (tapping sugar maples for sap), and berry-picking. Elders pass on stories at monthly community dinners and an annual family camp has been revitalized and grown significantly.” In 2017, Generations United named AGE to Age a Program of Distinction for the third time.
*** “Elder Fraud: Senior Swindles, Both by Relatives and Others, Are on the Rise,” by Gary Rotstein, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Dec. 28, 2017. “Giovanni Palumbi of Harrison City, Pa., was charged in October with stealing more than $300,000 that belonged to his mother after he took over power of attorney for her. Elder fraud crimes aren’t typically in the hundreds of thousands of dollars — pawned jewelry or ATM transactions without permission are more common — but financial exploitation of older adults for any amount is a key factor in surging reports of elder abuse across Allegheny County and Pennsylvania in recent years. Reports of alleged abuse of all kinds harming Allegheny County residents 60 and older climbed 137 percent from the 2012-13 fiscal year to 2016-17, according to the Allegheny County Area Agency on Aging.
*** MEXICO’S MEDICAL TOURISM SERIES — Part 1 — “New Mexicans Trek South of the Border for Dental Care in Palomas,” by Kent Paterson, NMPolitics.net (Dec. 5, 2017). In Palomas, Mexico, dental clinics with English-speaking staff serve a mainly elderly U.S. clientele. They’re joined by a sprinkling of pharmacies and optometry outlets. Violet Cauthon confessed that she and her husband, Ronald, 85, that the high U.S. costs motivate the hour-and-a-half drive from their home in Las Cruces, N.M., to Palomas. (Silver Century Foundation)
Part 2 — “Will Juárez and Mexico Be an Escape Valve for the U.S. Health Care Crisis?” (Dec. 27, 2017). The Ciudad Juárez Medical Tourism Cluster is working to elevate this city’s appeal to U.S. residents seeking affordable health and dental care by coordinating health care visits with food, lodging and transportation services.
*** “Filipino Caregivers Battle Lack of Sleep, Other Work Risks,” by Neil Gonzales, Philippine News/Diverse Elders Coalition, Dec. 26, 2017. Studies show the Filipinos and other direct-care workers must struggle with sleep deprivation, staffing shortages and inadequate pay, placing their clients at risk.
Thanks to the Silver Century Foundation, AARP, Commonwealth Fund, Retirement Research Foundation and the John A. Hartford Foundation for supporting this year’s fellowships. We are also pleased to be partnering with the Diverse Elders Coalition, which is cross-posting many of the fellowship articles, among them
English translations of stories originally released in Spanish, Chinese or other languages.
The Journalists Network on Generations (JNG), founded in 1993, publishes Generations Beat Online News (GBONews.org). JNG provides information and networking opportunities for journalists covering generational issues, but not those representing services, products or lobbying agendas. Copyright 2018 JNG. For more information contact GBO Editor Paul Kleyman.
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