The Social Security Administration (SSA) has announced it will be making a series of "key investments" in 2025.
Following the release of President Joe Biden's budget proposal for the fiscal year 2025, the SSA has outlined a series of areas in which funding will be used to protect Social Security and ensure it can keep delivering on its commitments. Released on Monday, it includes plans to improve customer services and a promise not to cut benefits.
The budget proposal requests $15.4 billion in discretionary budget authority for 2025, which is a $1.3 billion or 8.9 percent increase from the 2023 level, including cap adjustment funding, according to the budget text. The requests made in the budget all require the approval of Congress.
"The budget makes critical, targeted investments in the American people that will promote greater prosperity for decades to come," a press release issued by the SSA on Monday, March 11, reads.
What SSA Changes Are Coming?
The SSA has issued a press release that says funds from the 2025 budget will be used to improve the service in several areas.
No Benefit Cuts
In the press release, the SSA has said it is committed to opposing "any attempt to cut Social Security benefits as well as proposals to privatize Social Security."
Establishing Leave Program
The budget proposal also includes vast changes to medical and family leave, with plans to establish a national, comprehensive paid family and medical leave program administered by SSA.
As part of this, the money from the budget would be used to set up the program that "would provide up to 12 weeks of leave to allow eligible workers to take time off to: care for and bond with a new child; care for a seriously ill loved one; heal from their own serious illness; address circumstances arising from a loved one's military deployment; or find safety from domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking—otherwise known as 'safe leave.'"
The SSA has said that the "vast majority of America's workers do not have access to employer-provided paid family leave, including 73 percent of private sector workers."
Increasing Taxes on Wealthy
The budget outlines plans for imposing more tax on the wealthy, and "that protecting Social Security should start with asking the highest-income Americans to pay their fair share."
"The budget upholds the president's commitment to protecting Medicare and Social Security for this and future generations," the budget text reads. "The budget builds on the president's record to date, while achieving meaningful deficit reduction through measures that reduce wasteful spending and ask the wealthy and large corporations to pay their fair share."
Improving Services
The SSA will work to improve customer service at public-facing offices using funds from the budget. The administration has said "the budget also improves access to SSA's services by reducing wait times," although it does not outline how this will be done.
Newsweek has contacted the SSA for comment via email outside of normal working hours.
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Aliss Higham is a Newsweek reporter based in Glasgow, Scotland. Her focus is reporting on issues across the U.S., including ... Read more
