would now be free money-wise to pay off the claims that the elderly will justly make upon it, and industry-wise we would be much better off.

But it was the Politicians who said that it would be a fairer deal to keep it as a separate Act; that the money would be used only in relation to keeping the Country secure; and that it would not interfere with the profits of private businesses. So, the people grew old, paid into the Social Security as long as they could, and for a while anyway, the people who had worked hard retired and did have their 'golden years' with dignity.

Now, all of a sudden like some kind of monster it is reversed! We are told that thru some erratic figuring-that no one saw coming, of course-the bank account is depleting rapidly and soon will be no more! The ones who had jobs that paid well, perhaps they have a savings account or something similar; but by and large the common, everyday working person had just about enough in his pay-envelope to raise a family, educate their children, maybe even buy a house, but certainly their savings accounts were far from tangible!

And now, when their Country is supposed to help them, they find that the most cruel, unfair joke has been played on them!

No more Medi-care! No more homes for the aged! No more help for those who need help! No More-is all you'll get!

All there is left is dying-and is that what the Congress and Senate of the United States is going to tell those aged people: "Go home and die!" or, "The President whom we now have-and you elected him-says you should have saved in anticipation of this."

You might as well take a revolver and shoot them, and have it over and done with!

Mr. JEFFORDS. Thank you, Chauncey, very very well said. I appreciate it.

Will Albert Strodel and Hebert Ogden come down now.
Janet, please go ahead.

STATEMENT OF JANET LINCOLN, RUTLAND, VT.

Ms. LINCOLN. I am Janet Lincoln, from Rutland. I work on an SCS program right now. I hope it will continue, not just for the monetary value which I receive, but my husband is a totally disabled American veteran, and I need the money. Also it is the dignity which I have. I get up early in the morning, 5:30, and I work at the Army Reserve Center in Rutland. And I feel great-64 years old, going to work. If I had to stay home, I would be where a lot of other people are, sick, ill, disabled.

I am going blind in one eye. I do not let this get to me, because I have a job to go to. I go every day. I haven't had 1 day I have missed of work. I will say a lot of young people cannot say that today.

I thank you for the time. I didn't expect to be called, Jim. So I have no notes or anything, nothing was prepared.

I thank you for your time. And I appreciate everything you have done. I receive letters each month from Mr. Jeffords, and I appreciate everything he has done for us. He has helped my husband a great deal.

Thank you, Jim.

Mr. JEFFORDS. Thank you very much, Janet, I appreciate those words. Sometimes the best statements we get are those that people come to speak from the heart. I appreciate that very much. Thank you.

Is Kenneth Elan here?

Daphne, why don't you come down and join us also.
Rev. Albert Strobel. Please proceed.

STATEMENT OF REV. ALBERT STROBEL, MORRISVILLE, VT., REPRESENTING THE VERMONT STATE COUNCIL OF SENIOR CITIZENS, IN PLACE OF PRESIDENT LOUIS URBAN

Reverend STROBEL. My name is Albert Strobel, from Morrisville. I have been president of the County Senior Citizens for the past 13 years. I am an officer on the board of the Central Vermont Council on Aging. But today I am here representing another agency, and that is the Vermont State Council of Senior Citizens.

I am here in place of Mr. Louis Urban, who is the president, and who is currently in Michigan.

Mr. JEFFORDS. And is also one of the most strong advocates of the senior citizens in the State.

Reverend STROBEL. I should say, very noticeably so.

Well, Lew has written a document which it will take 2 or 3 minutes to read and that will be it. He says:

Mr. Chairman, Honorable Members of the Committee, ladies and gentlemen:

I regret that, due to a conflict of dates, I am unable to be present today but have asked one of our members, Rev. Albert T. Strobel of Morrisville, to represent the Vermont Council of Senior Citizens. We are a council of 35 clubs with a total of more than 3,000 members, affiliated with the National Council of Senior Citizens of Washington.

First we commend you for addressing the problems of retirement age people in the future. Social Security has done an excellent job overall for nearly 50 years. However, it is time to give thoughtful consideration of its direction in the next century. I offer the cooperation of our legislative committee and assume that the Research Department of the National Council of Senior Citizens is cooperating fully. In the meantime, there are some considerations. As of July 3rd, 1982, the national average monthly check for a retiree on Social Security will rise to $406, a mere $16 above the poverty level as stated this April by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services-a national figure which does not allow for Vermont weather.

Also by Social Security's own figures, 51 percent of its recipients have no more than 10 percent of their income from sources other than Social Security

At this time, the seniors living in Vermont cannot afford to have any services cut, especially Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security. I might add that 4,021 Vermonters are getting the Aid to the Aging which supplements Supplemental Security Income, which is $58.50 below poverty level.

The elderly are already spending more for health care, out of pocket an in proportion to income, than they did before Medicare and Medicaid began. Many cannot afford the additional expense of the Medicare B deductibles and the $260 we pay with each hospitalization. For some that $260 is close to an entire month's income. The people in Vermont have worked hard, often at small wages for long lifetimes. They did the best they could for their families and their communities. A lot of them have health problems and they don't deserve to be kept scared half to death now. Thank you for this opportunity to be heard.

Sincerely, Louis E. Urban, President.

Mr. JEFFORDS. Thank you very much for coming. It was an excellent statement. I know I will be hearing from Lou again, as I do frequently.

Thank you.

Edna Fairbanks Williams and John Outwater, please come and join us at the table.

STATEMENT OF DAPHNE GRATIOT

Ms. GRATIOT. Thank you for having us here in Woodstock. It has given a tremendous opportunity to a lot of people to express themselves in a very personal way to you and to your committee.

I would like to talk about the social security system. It seems to me the inequities built into the social security system which dis

criminate against women have been thoroughly studied and documented. Recommendations have been made to correct these inequities, and I would urge you to help get them enacted into law.

I would like to mention two major handicaps which program social security for financial failure-bankruptcy, if you can accept the drastic terminology.

First, too many workers are not contributing to the system. I refer to Federal and State employees. Many of these workers, after retirement from government service, enter the covered work force and eventually draw from two systems. I believe everyone acknowledges this flaw, but absolutely no one seems prepared to bite the bullet and correct the situation.

Second, I would like to point out another major financial handicap for the social security system which should be addressed, not just by reforming the laws governing social security, but by acknowledging and correcting the discrimination which permits and perpetuates an economic structure which relies on women being paid 59 cents for every dollar earned by men in the work force.

One of the panelists referred to the situation in his family where his retired father is taking out more in benefits than his two sons are contributing, and they are contributing the maximum.

If you accept this as a bad situation, I would like to point out that when 42 percent of the work force-women-are earning only 59 percent of what men earn, you have programed the social security system to a constant lowering of contributions.

If half the work force is systematically paid half as much as the other half, there's no way to balance contributions and payments. The absence of equal pay for equal worth must be an issue for the Congress, in all legislation which touches on employment, Federal contracts and regulations.

The present administration has not shown any great concern for women as contributors to government, the work force, or as equals under the Constitution, but I would hope you, Jim, and the other liberal members of the Congress to try to correct the inequities built into the social security system and the wages of this Nation before we reach the time when, as some are predicting, the total poverty class will be made up of women.

Thank you.

Mr. JEFFORDS. Thank you. That is an excellent point. I certainly share your concerns. I know in my own office, I try to make sure our pay is equal, and that we have been pretty good at being able to do that. But I recognize the inequities in the social security system which I addressed somewhat earlier, when Mr. Myers was at the table. I will be taking a very close look at what goes on in that area, as I share your concerns.

Thank you so much.

Ms. GRATIOT. I am aware in your office you are an equal employer. And I congratulate you on that.

Mr. JEFFORDS. Thank you. I also know you are checking me all the time.

Ms. GRATIOT. Right. Well, that is the way we all keep up to snuff. Mr. JEFFORDS. Right. Thank you.

Edna.

STATEMENT OF EDNA FAIRBANKS WILLIAMS

Ms. WILLIAMS. I am Edna Fairbanks Williams. I represent the Coalition on Jobs, Peace, and Justice, Good Neighbors, and half a dozen other groups.

I would like to say that I don't want to see social security and SSI eliminated. Last Christmas, I buried a worker that worked with me for a number of years, due to the fact of her being taken off and SSI pending being reinstated. Without the proper food and medicine-she had bad emphysema-she choked to death.

That could happen all over, everywhere, without the proper money for people.

I would like to ask you if you could introduce legislation that would put displaced homemakers, whatever the age, with the disabled, and so on, for that $3,000 tax credit or deduction per year, or whatever you call it, that would allow the shops to use some money to train them, and they would try harder to employ them.

The ages between 16 and 60 are very important years to have some help of some kind for jobs. If the shops don't gain by it, they are too lazy to do it. So the carrot helps.

Whether it be youth programs, or whatever, people need handson learning. These people would be paying taxes if they were working, and they would be helping small businesses.

Faire Edwards, myself, the YMCA, Business and Professional Women, some of us have been gathering statistics in the State. We know there are over 5,000 alone in this State-I don't know how many there are in other States, and it will get worse.

I don't know if this would be possible or not, but I would like to see some kind of legislation along this line.

Mr. JEFFORDS. All right. I will get you specifics on it. But the bill that Congressman Hawkins and I have is the reform of the CETA legislation. It does provide for assistance in training for displaced homeworkers, and displaced people generally, and disadvantaged people.

I will have sent to you the specifics of that, so that you will be able to understand what will be available if and when that legislation is passed this year.

As I said earlier, my main concern is the funding level which may not be what we would like to see. The less funds you have available, the harder it is, the more competition there is for the funds available.

I will make sure we notify you of that.

Ms. WILLIAMS. Yes. That is not exactly what I said.

Mr. JEFFORDS. I know. You are talking about the jobs tax credits. Ms. WILLIAMS. My daughter was mangled in an automobile accident some years ago. She has a bad arm. She decided to do a man's job in the quarry. Due to the fact that her arm looks horrible, she chose to wear a long-sleeved shirt when she applied for the job. She took the job of punching slate and yard person.

She wore her long sleeves until after her incubation period or learning period, or whatever you want to call it, was over. When she had made her time and more than made her time as far as piecework was concerned, it was getting quite hot; that was 2

weeks ago. So she pulled off her long sleeves and started wearing her short poor-boy shirts, and so on.

Well, this arm here was cut practically off with the cords, the tendons, the nerves and everything, and it is complete scar tissue. He then said to her, "How come that wasn't on your application blank?" He says, "I can get $3,000, he says, difference," he says.

And she says because I don't feel that I am disabled, and she says, "I don't see any reason why you should have the credit. You should hire somebody who is disabled."

Mr. JEFFORDS. I think she is right. Don't you?

Ms. WILLIAMS. Yes, I do. But the shops look for what they can get as far as hiring. So if you put the proper carrot out there, they will hire the proper type of people that you are trying to get into the job market.

So you are failing, if you do not have the proper carrot out there; that makes them reach out.

Mr. JEFFORDS. I understand. You say there should be an equal carrot for a displaced home worker.

Ms. WILLIAMS. Yes.

Mr. JEFFORDS. I understand. Thank you.

John Outwater, pleased to have you here. I appreciate your coming down.

STATEMENT OF JOHN OUTWATER

Mr. OUTWATER. Thank you very much.

I wanted to speak a little bit generally today. I teach at UVM. I do a lot of traveling. I have lived abroad about 20 years. When I come back now, this country is perfectly apparent to anyone that comes from Europe, in particular, that the public services that we expect and receive are just appalling in the United States. And we accept this.

We can see an example of that in this hall and in this town. We don't notice it too much if we live here. But if you go abroad and see the flowers and the condition of the various halls that you have over in Europe, it is apparent that there is a tremendous difference in what we put up with here.

The reason, I believe, is the use of the elderly in dignified jobs. I was impressed with a talk that I heard earlier here, which said, can we afford older citizens?

The question is, can we afford younger citizens, too, or working citizens, in the United States?

It seems to be quite apparent that we cannot if we expect to compete in a world market. We are watching unemployment grow. We are watching America becoming increasingly technologically backward. We are watching health, education, personal security, defense, becoming progressively vitiated.

The reason seems to be that if we can force the government or an employer to pay excessively, we do just that. We demand really a high-paying job or none. We do not appear to be prepared to share.

It seems, then, that we cannot ask any class of people to work for less than minimum, and we can pay people for not doing anything, which is essentially what social security is.

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