A new analysis released Tuesday asserts that if the U.S. government doesn’t come to an agreement about whether or not to raise the federal debt ceiling it could affect Social Security and Disability checks as soon as August 3.
The Bipartisan Policy Center found that, if the debt limit is not raised, the government would be unable to pay as much as 44 percent of its bills during the month of August. This might mean that the Treasury would not have the resources to make the $23 billion in Social Security payments due to go out August 3.
If not allowed extra funds to work with, the U.S. Treasury would have to prioritize the following bills: interest on debt, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, unemployment insurance, defense contracts, veterans’ benefits, IRS refunds, military active duty pay, federal salaries and benefits, special education programs, Pell Grants for college students, food and rent payments for the poor, and the funding of the country’s Justice, Labor, and Commerce departments.
“Based on publicly available data, we have estimated daily cash flows through the end of August 2011,” said BPC Visiting Scholar Jay Powell, a former Under Secretary of the Treasury for Finance under President George H. W. Bush. “Our analysis shows that the government will be unable to pay all of its bills on August 3 or sometime soon thereafter.”
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If you need help with your Social Security Disability benefits, contact the Social Security Disability lawyers at Newlin Disability.
