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Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays1101 14th Street, NW, Suite 1030Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 638-4200 Fax: (202) 638-0243 E-mail: info@pflag.org Web: http://www.pflag.org PFLAG Viewpoint on Social Security ReformDecember 3, 1998Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) is a national, family-oriented organization which has over 425 chapters in the United States. We represent over 70,000 members, donors and supporters. We are a non-profit, charitable and educational organization which traces its beginnings back some 25 years. PFLAG exists in order to promote the health and well-being of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered persons and their families and friends. These family members and friends have the same needs as the rest of our family members and friends. These include the needs provided for through social security -- primarily retirement, death, and disability benefits. We who are members of PFLAG have family members and friends who are in lifetime, committed relationships. Our heterosexual members can get married and be entitled to benefits through that marital relationship. The social security benefits we enjoy through our husbands or wives provide a safety net. Where one of us has sacrificed paid employment for the sake of raising a child or in some other way providing a family benefit (by, for instance, caring for an elderly and infirm relative), we know that our social security benefits are not limited to the years we worked outside the home. Society receives a benefit from this as well, as it allows for unpaid care for those in our society who cannot care for themselves. Those of us, however, whose lifetime commitment is to someone of the same gender, do not have access to that safety net. Social security will not provide benefits to my gay son's partner in the same way it will provide benefits to my non-gay son's wife. As a couple, my gay son and his partner will not be able to make the same choices as his brother and sister-in-law -- at least not without more serious financial sacrifices. Our government -- to which both brothers contribute through their taxes and their productive employment -- is not treating the two of them equally. Yet I know, from first-hand observation, that good, healthy same-gender relationships share the same admirable qualities and make the same contributions to our families, our communities and our country as good, healthy opposite-gender relationships. The core of family values is the ability to care for each other. I have seen and heard of extraordinary acts of caring by same-gender couples. Parents, siblings, nieces and nephews, abandoned and rejected children have found good, nurturing homes with same-gender couples. Often the alternative would have been institutionalized care. We ought not discourage that kind of caring. On behalf of our families, our friends and all those same- gender couples without family support, we ask that the needs of same-gender couples, and those who depend on them, not be forgotten when final decisions are made on social security reform. Please ensure that same-gender couples will have access to the same benefits as married couples. Social security is not just about retirement and death benefits, however. It also provides disability benefits. To those unable to work because of a disability, these benefits are critical. All too many of our member families have had to bear the terrible burden of suffering and grief which is the hallmark of AIDS. It is important that comprehensive reform of Social Security is designed so that disability benefits are available to those with disabling diseases such as AIDS and that those benefits are designed in a way which recognizes the often-unpredictable course of the disease.
Respectfully Submitted,
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