President Biden’s proposed $6.8 trillion budget for 2024, if passed as written, would extend the solvency of the Medicare Trust Fund by at least 25 years “without cutting any benefits or raising costs for beneficiaries,” the White House stated Thursday.

Biden said he would achieve this goal by increasing the Medicare tax rate from 3.8% to 5%. “No one earning less than $400,000 per year will pay a penny in new taxes,” a White House fact sheet stated.

The budget also proposes $15.5 billion in funding for Social Security to improve services. 

“Our programs affect individuals throughout their lives: from birth, to entering the workforce, to facing a disability or loss, and to retirement. The broad and critical nature of our programs drives our request for the resources necessary to improve our service to the public,” Kilolo Kijakazi, acting commissioner of Social Security, said in a statement Thursday afternoon. 

Additionally, the Biden budget provides for $150 billion over 10 years to improve and expand Medicaid home- and community-based services offered by assisted living and home care providers. And the proposal calls for $258 million to support the construction of an additional 2,200 units of affordable housing via the Section 202 Housing for the Elderly program or the Section 811 Housing for People with Disabilities program.

Additional features of the budget:

  • $7.5 billion for new Project-Based Rental Assistance contracts with private owners to provide affordable housing to households with extremely low incomes. These would be the first new PBRA contracts in 40 years or so.
  • Funding for 50,000 new Housing Choice Vouchers and the use of HUD reserves for another 130,000 households. Today, 30% of voucher-assisted households are older adults.

“America’s population is aging, rapidly. More people will need services – from care in their own homes and in residential settings, to community supports like affordable housing for low-income older adults,” Leading Age President and CEO Katie Smith Sloan said. “The federal government, for the first time in decades, is committed to meaningful action to ensure America’s older adults and families can get the help they need. We’re encouraged that the president’s public statements of support for older adults and families are reflected in the numbers released today.”

At the same time, Biden’s proposed budget is meant to cut the nation’s deficit by $3 trillion over the next decade. The president plans to do this “by levying a 25% minimum tax on the wealthiest Americans,” according to the White House.

The budget is unlikely to pass the House or Senate as proposed, however. Republicans hold a slim majority in the House, and Democrats hold a slim majority in the Senate.

“First of all, the President’s budget proposal is just that: a proposal. It’s dead on arrival in Congress, as it should be,” Rep. Ralph Norman (R-SC) stated.