U.S. Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun, right, discusses retirement issues at a policy seminar Jan. 26 at Cornell's Institute for Women and Work at the ILR conference center in New York. At left are Colleen Gardner, director of community services for the New York state AFL-CIO, and Francine Moccio, director of the Institute for Women and Work. Karl Crutchfield
NEW YORK -- U.S. Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun (D-Ill.) urged a reform of the Social Security system during a policy seminar on "Work and Retirement: The Impact of Social Security and Pension Reform in the New Millennium" Jan. 26 at Cornell's Institute for Women and Work at the School of Industrial and Labor Relations conference center in New York City.
Moseley-Braun said that the reform of Social Security and pension laws needs to be more in tune with the composition of today's work force, particularly working women, who made up a much smaller percentage of the labor force when the system was developed in 1935.
The seminar drew a large crowd of trade unionists, women's advocates and retirees. It was co-sponsored by the Cornell Institute for Women and Work and the New York state AFL-CIO.
Moseley-Braun, the first African-American female member of the U.S. Senate and the first permanent female member of the Senate Finance Committee and member of several other Senate committees, presented an in-depth discussion of the current proposed legislative changes before the Senate in Social Security and pension laws and their effects on women in particular.
For example, the average woman spends less time -- 11 years -- in the work force than the average man due to such factors as women's household and family responsibilities, Moseley-Braun pointed out. She also said women are more likely to work in industries that have inadequate or no pension plans and that, on average, less than one-third of all female retirees receive a pension.
Moseley-Braun noted further that women generally get half the benefits received by the average male retiree. As a result, women make up 75 percent of the elderly poor in America, she said.
Retirement security, the senator went on to say, is a "three-legged stool" built on individual savings, pensions, and social security. Individual savings has undergone some reform, she said, but a woman's ability to accumulate savings is constrained by her overall low earnings potential.
"As to pensions," Moseley-Braun said, "both political parties have taken up the challenge of promoting and protecting pension savings. Both the Retirement Security Act [by Democrats] and the WISER ACT [by Republicans] seek to improve pension access and coverage, promote pension portability and remove some of the structural inequalities faced by women in pension law."
Moseley-Braun said she has worked on behalf of the Women's Pension Equity Act, which should help women avoid what she called "pension surprise" -- the unexpected loss of pension benefits due to divorce, inadequate contributions, and/or unknowingly signing their rights away.
On the issue of Social Security, Moseley-Braun suggested that saving the program should be the first and foremost priority for the current generation of lawmakers.
"The generational compact which says we will do at least as much for [our children] as our parents did for us makes it imperative that we tackle the challenge of retirement security, not just for our retirement, but for theirs as well," Moseley-Braun said.
Marion E. O'Connor is a graduate research intern at the Institute for Women and Work.
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