The Communications Workers Of America Local 2201
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We would like to welcome Cingular into the Union family. In January, Cingular workers voted to have a Union in their workplace. Our Local now will represent Cingular technicians and retail store employees from Fredericksburg to Colonial Heights. Cingular is also offering a discount to all Union members. All you would need to do is bring your membership card into a Cingular store when you sign up for service. Cingular is the only wireless carrier that has been neutral toward their employees unionizing. Verizon Wireless has fought the Union every step of the way. Due to this we are asking all of our members to switch to Cingular and support our new brother and sisters.
An Introduction to Social Security Social Security is one of America's most important and successful programs, providing over $471 billion in benefits to more than 47 million people in 2003. While Social Security is often considered simply a retirement program, about one-third of its beneficiaries are not retirees. The Social Security system provides three distinct types of benefits for workers and their families: lifetime retirement benefits for retirees who have worked at least ten years, their spouses, and their children; disability insurance for workers, their spouses, and their children; and survivors' insurance for the families of deceased workers. Social Security guarantees working and retired Americans and their families economic stability that keeps them out of poverty. Social Security benefits are part of a social insurance program and its benefits are distinct from employer-provided pensions, Individual Retirement Accounts (IRAs), or other forms of savings. Retired workers are guaranteed an inflation-indexed payment for their entire lifetime. Other forms of saving have much more risk. For example, an employer pension program may go bankrupt, private investments face substantial risk if there is a market downturn, and workers' savings may run out. The disability insurance provided by Social Security protects workers and their families against a physical or mental disability that renders someone unable to work; the survivors' insurance provides benefits to the families of deceased workers. The Bush Administration has been making alarming claims that the current Social Security program is "in crisis" and is unsustainable. These exaggerations simply are not true. Estimates by the Social Security trustees (using rather pessimistic assumptions) and the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) indicate that the trust fund is solvent for another 38 to 48 years if we do nothing. In other words, Social Security is not going broke anytime soon. Despite the fact that the Social Security trust fund is as robust today as it has been in recent years, the administration proposes to radically change the Social Security program by cutting benefits while at the same time allowing workers to create individual private accounts. While the exact provisions are not clear, any privatization proposal will not, in and of itself, do anything to ameliorate the shortfall projected in 2042 or 2052. The administration has said that it considers Model 2 proposed by the President's Commission to Strengthen Social Security a "good blueprint" for reform. That proposal does not "fix" Social Security but instead imposes significant new costs on the existing program coupled with significant cuts in benefits. First, the government will have to borrow trillions of dollars to pay for "transitional" costs since fewer revenues will be available to pay for current beneficiaries. Second, the administration's plan will significantly cut Social Security benefits (even for those who choose not to create a private account) with the exception of those who are at or near retirement today. For example, the CBO estimates that Model 2 would cut benefits under current law by 45% for average earners retiring in 2065. It is only through benefit cuts that the administration can pretend to address the shortfall that the Bush Administration's Social Security trustees predict when huge payroll tax revenues are diverted into private accounts. Many workers will be unable to make up these benefit cuts with their returns on their private accounts. And women, minorities, and low-income wage earners will be particularly hit by these changes. Finally, beneficiaries of the disability insurance and survivor portions of Social Security will have their benefits cut as well, with no way to close the gap. The Bush Administration's privatization proposal will not "save" Social Security but will do just the opposite -- it will erode a vital social insurance program that provides American workers and their families with a core level of income during retirement, disability, and early death. Learn more at http://www.epinet.org/content.cfm/issueguide_socialsecurity.
Social Security is the nation's most important
program for retirement security. It is a guaranteed, risk-free secure system. It
was created to help supplement workers' employer-sponsored pension and personal
savings. It is considered the "crown jewel" of our nation's social safety net
because it has cut poverty among the elderly by two-thirds. Workers earn Social Security during the years they work before retirement and help pay for the Social Security of future generations. Workers contribute 6.2% of their payroll tax into a trust fund to pay for their Social Security benefits upon retirement. Low-and-middle-income workers pay this tax disproportionately. Employers pay a matching 6.2% tax. Social Security uses the average gains in a worker's lifetime to calculate an initial level for retirement disability, and survivor benefits. To ensure stable income replacement over time, the formula is adjusted for wage growth, instead of for inflation. Social Security currently faces a dilemma because people are living longer; 77 million baby boomers are nearing retirement age. Because today's birth rate is low, there now exists a large drop in the worker-to-beneficiary ratio to fund the system for future generations. There is no immediate need to change Social Security. It is not in crisis. Social Security has been able to guarantee workers full-benefits upon retirement, and will continue to do so for many years to come. While it is predicted that in 2018 Social Security will start paying out more in benefits than it collects in payroll taxes, the system will still pay full promised benefits until 2042 and at least 70% of benefits after that. Long-term projections for Social Security are more optimistic now and government actuaries have pushed back the date of projected insolvency (from 2029 to 2042). The Congressional Budget Office predicts that the trust fund will last even longer (2052). The shortfall can be corrected with a few legislative fixes to Social Security, not dismantling it. Improvements must be based on solid accounting, not gimmicks or individual accounts that put a quick buck into the hands of Wall Street's money managers. The following are some ways to put needed funds into Social Security include: (1) put back the funds Congress took out of the Social Security Trust Fund; (2) repeal President Bush's tax cuts for the wealthiest 1 percent; (3) maintain the inheritance tax for millionaires; or (4) raise the payroll tax to the first $190,000 of income. Instead, President Bush wants to overhaul the system by chipping away at Social Security's very foundation, that of providing guaranteed benefits to all retirees. Diverting Funds to Private Retirement Accounts. CWA opposes President Bush's proposed Individual Retirement Accounts. Under this method, tomorrow's seniors would lose retirement security. Private accounts will ruin the Social Security system, not save it. Other proposals that may cripple Social Security include: (1) changing the way the government calculates funding future benefits; (2) raising the retirement age (above the average age of mortality, age 80); (3) raising the payroll tax by 20 percent; (4) replacing the payroll tax as Social Security's financing mechanism and adding a savings plan for long-term or chronic care to augment Social Security payments; or (5) making tax cuts for the rich permanent which would result in cuts to future benefits for the elderly, disabled, and even the families of workers who have died. CWA opposes any legislation that would create "individual security accounts" funded by employee Social Security payroll deductions. This would change the Social Security system's funding mechanism by allowing young workers to divert up to 4% of the 6.2% paid in social security payroll taxes (about two-thirds) into these accounts so they could be invested in the risky stock market. Annual contributions would stop at $1,000 to $1,300. If these accounts don't perform well because individuals invested wrong -- tomorrow's elderly could face big trouble because guaranteed full benefits would no longer exist for this group. "Owning" Private Accounts. Today's young workers should get what they earned during their working years, not false promises. President Bush's "ownership society" plan -- of limited government where individuals are responsible for their own retirement security, and where young workers would "own" these diverted social security funds, is troubling. There are trade-offs for those who choose these individual accounts. The plan includes a "claw back" to later reduce one's retirement benefit (with interest) -- that could mean 50 cents for every dollar out of your social security benefits. So much for the appeal of owning one's account. It's not "voluntary" and comes with benefit cuts. To pay for creating individual accounts, this measure would change the way one's social security benefits are calculated using a price index, instead of wages (although wages rise faster than inflation). Benefits would be reduced, and these cuts would apply to everyone. For today's young worker, this would mean a 40 percent cut in benefits. Even if one chooses not to participate in these accounts, benefits would still be reduced. Workers who remain in the traditional system would experience a benefit cut of $9,000 per year when they retire. It makes no sense to make individual accounts part of Social Security. There already exists a plan for individual accounts to save up for retirement on top of Social Security -- they are called 401 (K) plans and IRAs (Individual Retirement Accounts). According to researcher Peter Orzag of the Brookings Institute, only 35 of all females today opt-in to 401 (K) plans, while 86 percent opt-out. Only 19 percent of Hispanics opt-in, while 75 percent opt-out. What American workers need is an easier way for them to save. No "choice". These funds must be invested through a centralized government agency, not by individuals. If a worker needs these funds, they won't be available to him or her. Workers won't have a choice to withdraw them until they retire, even if one becomes disabled! This is unrealistic. Workers would not be able to pass the accounts on to their heirs. Under this measure, individuals must turn their accounts into lifetime annuities that must be used to provide retirement income. If so, they cannot be passed on to one's heirs. Individual Retirement Accounts will add to the deficit. This measure would permanently damage Social Security by diverting nearly $2 trillion to $5 trillion over the next 10 years from the Social Security Trust Fund to pay transition fees to Wall Street for managing these accounts. Congress would have to borrow heavily to pay for these costs -- which could cut long-term liabilities by $13 trillion! President Bush's proposal is fiscally irresponsible. It takes effect after he leaves office. Today's deficits will play a great role in future funding of Social Security. The government as a whole faces big fiscal challenges well before 2042 and Social Security is a very small part of the problem. The federal budget is currently more than $400 billion short. The U.S. dollar is also weak. Social Security is projected to have a shortfall of $3.7 trillion dollars. President Bush's projection of $10 trillion dollars uses infinite numbers, and 60 percent of these costs would occur after the year 2078! To pay for major changes in the Social Security program, the funding would have to come from extensive borrowing and cuts in vital public programs and benefits. The United States should not depend on other countries to fund its trust fund. IOUs will not fix Social Security. CWA supports a return of extracted-funds back to the Social Security Trust Fund by repealing the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans given away by the last Congress, and maintaining the inheritance tax for millionaires. Repealing tax cuts for those earning over $200,000 a year will return $2.9 trillion dollars to the treasury. Retaining the estate tax at the 2009 level would return $1.0 trillion dollars. This would amount to $3.9 trillion dollars. There is a potential for waste and corruption. This could lead to a potentially corrupt process of politicians choosing which of their Wall Street friends will get the money. Freezing Growth in Social Security Benefits. CWA opposes President Bush's proposal to freeze future growth in Social Security benefits to current living standards. This change to the formula used to calculate Social Security benefits would leave retirees to receive lesser payouts than expected under today's law. It would index future benefits to inflation rather than using increases in wages to slow the growth in benefits. It is predicted that wages will most likely grow faster than inflation in the future; therefore, under this measure, individuals at all income levels would absorb larger income losses at retirement. For example, this method would cut the share of lifetime average income replaced by Social Security in half in 70 years. Social Security currently replaces 42 percent of earnings for the average worker age 65. Under this method, income replacement will fall to about 27% in 35 years, and 18% in 70 years. Price-indexing would be more damaging to low-and-middle income workers who tend to have less non-Social Security income to fall back on. These workers are also more likely to become disabled or die before they can use their Social Security benefits. Higher-Payroll Taxes. Low-and-middle income workers should not be the one's to shoulder this responsibility. CWA supports raising the payroll tax cap to include a larger share of the income of highly-paid individuals (e.g., income above the current cap of $90,000). According to a White House memo, the latest Social Security's trustees report cites that "...the current system's benefit formula would require some $10 trillion in tax increases over the long term." This would require raising the payroll tax by 20 percent "simply to provide waged-indexed benefit levels to those born this year." Public Workers. CWA opposes including "newly-hired" state and local workers in the Social Security system. This expansion would not improve the solvency of the Social Security Trust Fund in the long-term. Instead it will disrupt already well-established public pension plans. This would harm state and local pension programs that are currently well funded and would increase costs to state and local governments. It would hurt public safety officers most of whom face mandatory retirement years before the Social Security retirement age. For further information, contact: Rosie Torres, CWA Representative-Legislation (202) 434-1315 rtorres@cwa-union.org
Offshoring has become a flashpoint issue as we learn the range of jobs that now are moving to India, Malaysia, Eastern Europe and China—computer programmers, network engineers, telephone service representatives, radiologists, accountants, cartoon animators, journalists and others. Exporting America: The list -- CNN, Lou Dobbs Tonight -- "Here is a list of companies we've confirmed are "Exporting America." These are U.S. companies either sending American jobs overseas, or choosing to employ cheap overseas labor, instead of American workers. According to CNN, Lou Dobbs, Verizon has already exported some jobs overseas : http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/lou.dobbs.tonight/.
Wal-Mart announced Feb. 9 it will shut down the Canadian store
where workers had formed a union six months earlier to have a voice on the job.
Select the link below to sign the petition telling Wal-Mart to do the right thing by reversing plans to close its store and negotiate in good faith with Wal-Mart workers! http://www.unionvoice.org/campaign/walmart_accountable_cwa
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