President
Obama calls on Congress to extend Economic
Recovery Payment for 2010
WASHINGTON, DC-President Obama announced his support for an
additional $250 Economic Recovery Payment to
the seniors, veterans and people with
disabilities who are struggling to make ends
meet with retirement savings that have not
fully recovered from their losses over the
first year of the recession.
“Even as we seek to bring about recovery, we must act on
behalf of those hardest hit by this
recession.
"That is why I am announcing my support for an additional
$250 in emergency recovery assistance to
seniors, veterans, and people with
disabilities to help them make it through
these difficult times.
"These payments will provide aid to more than 50 million
people in the coming year, relief that will
not only make a difference for them, but for
our economy as a whole, complementing the
tax cuts we’ve provided working families and
small businesses through the Recovery Act,”
said President Obama.
“This additional assistance will be especially
important in the coming months, as countless
seniors and others have seen their
retirement accounts and home values decline
as a result of this economic crisis.
"I want to compliment all the members of Congress who have
been working to address these challenges,
especially Senators Reid, Baucus, Sanders,
and Lincoln, Speaker Pelosi, and
Representatives Rangel, McCarthy, and
DeFazio.”
Fact Sheet
The President’s proposal would provide an additional year
of the $250 “Economic Recovery Payments”
initially enacted under the American
Reinvestment & Recovery Act (ARRA). Under
this proposal:
57 million people would benefit. These include 49 million
Social Security beneficiaries, 5 million
Supplemental Security Income beneficiaries,
2 million veterans benefit recipients, 0.5
million railroad retirement and disability
beneficiaries, and also about 1 million
public-employee retirees not entitled to any
of the previous benefits.
The benefit would be $250 – or equivalent to a 2 percent
increase in benefits for the average Social
Security retiree beneficiary. Under the
rules no person could “double dip” and
receive a $250 Economic Recovery Payment
through more than one program. Nor could
they receive both an Economic Recovery
Payment and the Making Work Pay tax credit.
The total cost of the proposal would be $13 billion – and
would not hurt the solvency of Social
Security. The President is committed to
ensuring that the $13 billion cost of the
proposal does not reduce the solvency of
Social Security or other social insurance
programs.
Would extend an effective relief program. To date Economic
Recovery Payments have been made to 55
million people including seniors, veterans
and people with disabilities and totaled
$13.7 billion. Most of the checks were
mailed out in May 2009.
In addition to this legislative proposal, the Internal
Revenue Service and the Department of
Treasury will take steps this week to
prevent reductions in the amounts that
workers can contribute to IRAs, 401(k)s, and
other aspects of tax-favored retirement
systems in 2010 that some feared could
result from negative inflation over the past
twelve months.
