National Senior Investor Initiative Act of 2019

Floor Speech

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Mr. FOSTER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I am proud to support H.R. 1876, the Senior Security Act of 2019, a bipartisan bill introduced by Congressman Gottheimer and Congressman Hollingsworth.

The financial exploitations of senior citizens is a major problem today, and with the aging of the baby boomer generation, it will only get worse in the coming years.

By 2030, one in five persons in the U.S. is projected to be 65 or older. That would equal approximately 75 million people who are senior citizens.

It is also estimated that nearly one in five Americans over the age of 65 have been a victim of financial exploitation. This can take many forms, including being steered towards inappropriate investment, paying unreasonably high fees for financial services, or outright fraud.

Senior citizens are often targeted because they are more likely to suffer from problems of memory and judgment, making them vulnerable to fraud. Exacerbating the issue is that the overwhelming majority of incidents of elder financial exploitation go unreported to authorities.

The Senior Security Act would help combat elder financial abuse by creating a task force in the SEC to identify the challenges that senior investors encounter and areas in which senior investors would benefit from changes to SEC regulations.

The bill also requires that the GAO conduct a study on the financial exploitation of senior citizens. The GAO study would give us an important comprehensive look at this issue, including a breakdown of the economic costs of financial exploitation of senior citizens, answers to how often this happens, why such abuses often go unreported, and factors that contribute to an increased risk of exploitation.

Americans work hard over their lifetime in order to save for retirement and be financially safe and secure when they get older. Unscrupulous people and companies would take advantage of these senior citizens and rob them of their hard-earned money. Those people and companies should not be able to get away with such egregious behavior.

This bill would allow us to more effectively combat this growing problem. For that reason, I want to thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Gottheimer) and the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Hollingsworth) for bringing this bipartisan initiative forward.

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Mr. FOSTER. Madam Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Gottheimer), the coauthor of this legislation.

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Mr. FOSTER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of the time.

Madam Speaker, I want to congratulate, again, Mr. Gottheimer and Mr. Hollingsworth for having brought this bill to the floor. I urge my colleagues to join us in supporting this important piece of legislation to comprehensively examine and strengthen the protections against financial exploitation of our senior citizens.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. FOSTER. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

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