Here’s one big reason congressional Republicans and the deficit hawks are dead wrong about cutting Social Security benefits: According to a new study, nearly half (47.4 percent) of all Americans between the ages of 60 and 90 will experience at least one year of poverty or near poverty and seniors of color are twice as likely to be affected.

The study by Mark Rank, a professor of social work at Washington University in St. Louis, shows that 58 percent of seniors between 60 and 84 will, at some point, not have enough liquid assets to allow them to weather an unanticipated expense or downturn in income.

But if you are a senior who is black or unmarried or have less than a high school education, the likelihood that you will be poor at some point increases dramatically. Rank found that although 32.7 percent of white older Americans will experience at least one year below the official poverty line, the percentage for black older Americans was nearly double at 64.6 percent.

For unmarried seniors, the percentage experiencing poverty was 51.2 percent compared with 24.9 percent for married older Americans. Likewise, for those with fewer than 12 years of education, the percentage experiencing poverty was 48.4 percent compared with 20.5 percent for those with 12 or more years of education.

Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), the Congressional Black Caucus chair, has said:

Safeguarding Social Security is more imperative now than ever. Social Security keeps 20 million Americans out of poverty—many of whom are people of color. As we move into the 112th Congress…we must work together to ensure that Social Security remains intact and solvent for generations to come.

Most American agree. In a new poll, more than eight in 10 likely voters across the political spectrum say they oppose cutting Social Security to reduce the national deficit.

Rank says we can expect greater numbers of seniors will face periods of poverty because Americans are living longer, there are fewer workers in the prime earning years and Americans have not been saving enough for retirement.

He recommends that legislators consider policies that encourage greater levels of savings among the working-age population, facilitating cooperative living arrangements among the elderly and strengthening the Social Security and Supplemental Security Income programs.

You can read Rank’s article, “A Life Course Approach to Understanding Poverty Among Older American Adults,” in the current issue of “Families in Society: The Journal of Contemporary Social Services” here (subscription required).

Although it’s a healthy and profitable company, Express Scripts (ESI), the second largest pharmacy benefit manager in the country, is taking advantage of the tight economy to demand its staff give up wages and benefits.

In contract talks, ESI demanded that the 900 pharmacists and other workers at its processing facilities in Bensalem, Pa., a suburb of Philadelphia, accept cuts totaling $8.8 million in pay and benefits. When the workers, members of SEIU Healthcare PA, rejected the company’s demands, ESI closed one of the plants and announced it was closing another and moving the work elsewhere. If both plants close, some 1,000 workers will be out of jobs just before Christmas.

Workers in other ESI locations, who are represented by AFSCME and the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), are supporting the SEIU members in their fight to save their jobs and gain a fair contract. Ironically, ESI, which posted earnings of $1.7 billion last year, processes prescriptions for numerous union plans and state and local governments, many of which are union.

Members of the St. Louis Workers’ Rights Board, an affiliate of Jobs with Justice, will conduct a hearing this afternoon on allegations of worker abuse by workers employed at ESI’s two Bensalem facilities. The board also will hear testimony from Express Scripts workers from other parts of the country who say they faced intimidation from management while trying to form unions.

The National Labor Relations Board regional director in Philadelphia last week issued a complaint against the company for the plant closing, saying ESI did not bargain in good faith. The two sides will resume negotiations Dec. 8.

In a letter to Express Scripts CEO George Paz, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said:

Putting aside the issue of why a profitable company needs to destroy good jobs, I am very troubled over what this means for ESI’s ability to provide for its customers, many of whom receive their benefits through union benefit plans. 

Simply put, this seems like an attempt by your company to use the current economic climate to pressure your employees into accepting significant reductions in compensation.      

You can help by donating to the workers’ Fight Back Fund to ensure they have the money to keep fighting for their jobs and to help support soon-to-be laid-off workers. To donate to the fund, click here, and here for more information on the workers’ struggle.

A new report found that ESI is expanding so rapidly the company may be overvalued, and is so loaded with debt its liquidity may be in danger. The report, “Overdosing on Greed,” says the company’s rapid expansion—its profits have grown 400 percent in the past decade—has caused “significant problems.” According to the report:

Over the past 10 years, a number of health plans and state governments have audited and sued ESI, claiming that the company systematically overcharges its clients, and ESI has paid out millions in settlements. Shareholders sued ESI and its directors, alleging that executive pay packages were inflated at their expense.

Download a copy of the full report here.

Between 2007 and 2009, with increasing unemployment and workers losing their employer-provided health coverage, along with declining incomes, the number of uninsured non-elderly Americans increased from 45 million to 50 million, according to a new report.

The report, in the journal Health Affairs, also examines changes in health insurance coverage over the past decade and found that even in years of economic growth, the number of uninsured climbed as more and more employers dropped health coverage for their workers.

The study, by John Holahan of The Urban Institute for Kaiser Family Foundation’s Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured (KCMU) also found that while the number of children with health coverage grew, even as employer-provided insurance declined, most of that was due to increased coverage by Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).

Throughout the past decade, even in good economic times, the number of Americans with employer-sponsored insurance has fallen, and the number of uninsured Americans has increased. This finding underscores the importance of planned coverage expansions under the Affordable Care Act.

Looking at the 2007 to 2009 period, here are a few of the key findings:

• The number of non-elderly Americans insured through employers declined from 164.5 million to 156.2 million; much of this was because of job loss and movement from full-time to part-time work or unemployment.
• For adults, only some of this loss in insurance was offset by added public coverage; the number of uninsured adults increased by 5.6 million.
• The proportion of children covered through employer-sponsored coverage also declined, but this change was offset by increases in Medicaid and CHIP coverage. As a result, the number of uninsured children actually fell.

Holahan also found that more than 60 percent of the newly uninsured were Caucasian Americans and only a very small share were not citizens. The largest percentage increase in the uninsured occurred in the Midwest, where the loss of manufacturing jobs contributed to higher unemployment rates and the loss of health coverage.

He says the new health care reform law; the Affordable Care Act, will address many of these issues, and largely end the link between employment loss and insurance coverage, but not until 2014, when many of the act’s provisions take effect. Until then, he says:

It t is likely that employer-sponsored insurance will continue to decline because premiums will almost certainly grow faster than wages and salaries and the number of uninsured people is likely to increase.

Click here for the full article.

The paper was released in conjunction with a public briefing co-sponsored by KCMU and the Alliance for Health Reform that examined the impact of the economic downturn on health insurance coverage trends. You can view a webcast of the briefing and find links to related materials here.