6 New Social Security Bills in Congress Now

"Social Security is on the ballot," according to Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works. Altman, whose advocacy group supports expanding Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, said that if President Joe Biden is reelected, "real progress in eliminating the [Social Security] shortfall will be made." In a new Trump adminstration, by contrast, no progress would be made, she told ThinkAdvisor in a recent email. The Democratic party "is clearly on record in favor of expanding benefits with no cuts, and restoring Social Security to long range actuarial balance by requiring the uber-wealthy to pay what is generally considered their fair share," Altman said. Democrats have introduced a number of bills that do just that. Two prominent ones: the Social Security 2100 Act and the Social Security Expansion Act, Altman said. "Both have been introduced this Congress in both the House and Senate. Both expand benefits across-the-board and in targeted ways while ensuring that all benefits can be paid in full and on time for many decades," Altman said. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York, "who will be speaker if the Democrats regain control of the House, will almost assuredly bring up for a vote one of those bills," according to Altman. Republicans, meanwhile, "won't want to vote against it because they know it is popular with their constituents, but won't want to vote for it because it is unpopular with their billionaire donors," Altman predicted. "It will pass the House with or without their votes, but will be filibustered in the Senate so won't become law next year." Social Security, however, will be "an important election issue, and will gradually move the Republicans. In that case, I would predict a bill that restores Social Security to balance by increasing its dedicated revenue could become law in 2027," Altman opined. "In stark contrast, Trump and his fellow Republicans oppose all revenue increases, which leaves only benefit cuts — either through legislation or automatically in the early 2030s," Altman said. "They don't want to propose legislation that cuts benefits, so that leads to getting us simply closer to automatic cuts."

'Saving' Social Security

While few policy experts expect big changes to Social Security in the run-up or immediate aftermath of the November elections, a number of ideas have bubbled up, including investing the trust fund assets and ending 401(k) plan tax breaks and using the resulting revenue savings to shore up the funds. In late March, the Republican Study Committee, which comprises about 80% of House Republicans, called in its fiscal 2025 budget proposal for the Social Security eligibility age to be tied to life expectancy. See the gallery for bills that have been introduced this year to, among other measures, repeal the federal taxation of Social Security benefits and change how cost-of-living adjustments are calculated.