Protecting America’s Most Successful Social Program

Social Security Turns 90

On August 14, 1935, Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act, the foundation of the social safety net in the United States. The Roosevelt Institute recognized that 90th anniversary yesterday with a post from FDR’s grandson Jim Roosevelt—who’s sounding the alarm about what’s at stake.

“The program my grandfather signed into law on this day in 1935 is under attack,” Roosevelt writes, “not just in rhetoric, but through deliberate acts of administrative sabotage.”

The Trump administration is attempting to consolidate political control over the Social Security Administration, spreading lies to Social Security recipients and weaponizing Social Security death files to crack down on immigrants. These efforts politicize and erode trust in a program that has long been regarded as the most successful and trustworthy social program in American history.

“Let’s be honest about what this is. It’s a naked attempt to rewrite the American social contract,” Roosevelt writes. “But I’m here to say: not on our watch.”

Read the full post: “Celebrate Today but Fight Tomorrow: Social Security’s Anniversary Is a Call to Action”

And check out our new Social Security hub page, which spotlights Roosevelt Institute explainers unpacking the program’s ins and outs—as well as the threats it faces.

Don’t Miss: Anna Gifty Opuku-Agyeman in Conversation with Chelsea Clinton

Why is it so expensive to be a woman in America?

Anna Gifty Opuku-Agyeman, Roosevelt’s graduate fellow in macroeconomics, unpacks this question in her new book, The Double Tax: How Women of Color Are Overcharged and Underpaid, which she’ll be discussing with Chlesea Clinton next month at the 92nd St Y.

In a phenomenon Opoku-Agyeman terms “the double tax,” data reveal not only that women incur higher costs than men, but also that Black and white women lead vastly different lives, marked by dramatic gaps in job opportunities, salaries, housing costs, childcare access, and generational wealth. Her book details these findings and offers concrete solutions for how to level the playing field.

What We’re Talking About

What We’re Reading

• On the care economy: Roosevelt Senior Fellow Lenore Palladino spoke with Ms. Magazine about gender divisions in the workforce: “Framing care work not as something that’s about the home, but is about our economy, and the jobs that we have now, and the jobs that we’re going to have in the future, and making them quality jobs so that men will take them, is actually key.”
• On AI: Roosevelt Fellow Samantha Shorey spoke to Marketplace about the pitfalls associated with replacing government workers’ roles with AI technology. She points out how AI systems that are introduced with the intention of saving time can sometimes result in more work.
  • Read more from Shorey in her July Roosevelt report: “AI and Government Workers: Use Cases in Public Administration”