The proposal in the “Big Beautiful Bill” to add an extra deduction of $4,000 for filers collecting Social Security payments within certain income limits and for people age 65 and older could be a significant boon to areas of the country with a large share of older beneficiaries, according to Bloomberg calculations.
For instance, some of highest concentrations of retirees in the country are in Southwest Florida, the communities of the Villages in central Florida, parts of Arizona, and the upper peninsula of Michigan, all solidly red areas of the country.
As Bloomberg adds, in 2023, the latest data available, Florida’s 17th congressional district had more than 236,000 beneficiaries age 65 and older.
In aggregate, people in that congressional seat collected $533 million a month in Social Security payments that year.
The increase in the standard deduction in these areas with a high concentration of older beneficiaries would create a significant uptick in disposable income for parts of the US.