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About This Project
Summary
When these stories were commissioned, Congress was cutting Medicaid and SNAP and a report on future shortfalls in the Social Security trust fund were headline news. To give Americans a deeper understanding of what was at stake if programs were defunded or cut, we profiled older adults who depend on these programs. Each person shares their vulnerability and shows how access to the programs changed their lives for the better, and the ways in which losing them would be catastrophic.
Goals & Objectives
We wanted to give readers an understanding of the impact these programs have on adult lives beyond the statistics. We let each person tell their own story and share the ways that the government-run programs give them stable income, food in their pantry or access to health care.
Results & Impact
We saw up to 131,000 page views for the series. AARP Bulletin (print) picked up the Social Security story, which went out to AARP’s 37 million members. These stories were shared with members of Congress as they debated cuts to provide context as they made decisions.
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