Yesterday, SEIU personal care assistant Shareen Miller joined other workers and advocates to launch "Wake Up, Washington!" month [1], a speak out on retirement security. "There's no way I can keep doing such physically demanding work for another 10 or 20 years," said Miller, who cares for a client with spastic cerebral palsy. "It's scary not knowing how we're going to afford to retire without being a burden to our children."
At the launch of the event, it was revealed that Americans face a $6.6 trillion retirement income deficit [2]. That's the gap between the retirement savings that American households have today and what they should have for a secure retirement. Learn more about "Wake Up, Washington!" Month at Retirement USA [3].
"Hands Off My Social Security and Medicare!"
On Tuesday, Washington, D.C.-area SEIU members joined seniors and retiree advocates outside of the book launch party [4] for "Young Guns: A New Generation of Conservative Leaders"to send the attending authors -- U.S. Representatives. Eric Cantor, Kevin McCarthy and Paul Ryan- a message: "Hands Off My Social Security and Medicare!" "Young Guns" trumpets Ryan's 'Roadmap' budget plan [5] that would bring back the President Bush-era scheme to privatize Social Security and replace Medicare with a voucher system that shortchanges seniors on medical care.
Watch the video about the "Young Guns" proposal here:
This blog entry was written by the Service Employees International Union [6] and is cross-posted on the SEIU blog [7].