Other, general social insurance

Among Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s many legal accomplishments was her role in successfully challenging gender discrimination in the Social Security Act.

In 1974, as a law professor at Columbia University and founder of The Women’s Rights Project at the American Civil Liberties Union, she filed suit against Caspar Weinberger, then Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, on the basis that Social Security’s treatment of surviving spouses violated the equal protection and due process clauses of the U.S. Constitution.

At issue was the Social Security Act’s provision of surviving spouse benefits (Section 402(g)). In this case, the plaintiff was a widower who claimed that he should receive survivor benefits determined the same way as for widows, so that he would be able to care for their child.

Over Labor Day, I read The Vanishing American Dream, by Gene Ludwig (Disruption Books, 2020). He is Chief Executive Officer and Founder of IBM’s Promontory Financial Group and served as the Comptroller of the Currency during the Clinton Administration. He is a long-time colleague and Promontory was a sponsor of the Academy’s 2013 Ball Award.

The book relates the proceedings of an April 2019 symposium at Yale Law School in which just over two dozen thought leaders, including Academy Members Larry Summers and 2020 Ball Award recipient Jacob Hacker, offered their perspectives on “the economic realities facing middle- and lower-income Americans.”

Despite the pandemic, and in some ways because of it, the Academy’s 2020 Summer Internship Programs offered unique opportunities. Although many internships were canceled, the Academy was able to launch a 100% virtual program with eight students from across the country.

2020 INTERNSHIP PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS

Stanford G. Ross, a former National Academy of Social Insurance Board President (1990-1992), passed away last week. Stan’s remarkable career included serving at the U.S. Treasury Department, on the White House domestic policy staff, as the seventh Commissioner of the Social Security Administration, as Chairman of the Social Security Advisory Board, and as a Public Trustee of the Social Security and Medicare Trust Funds.

We remain outraged and pained by the heinous murders of Rayshard Brooks, George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, David McAtee, Ahmaud Arbery, and countless other Black people in the United States, killed by police brutality and racial injustice. We send our heartfelt condolences to the families and communities directly and deeply impacted by these travesties of justice. We stand with the many communities, organizations, and activists leading the fight for racial equity and justice.