The three broad areas of concern are the right to an adequate income, the right to health care, and freedom from restraints on life, liberty, and property. The handbook deals with the right of older people to receive the benefits promised by law: Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, Medicare, and others. It covers major laws affecting older people as well as court decisions and rules issued by the government agencies responsible for administering these laws. Because agencies such as the Social Security Administration and state health and welfare bureaucracies play a large role in the lives of the elderly, Brown and the Legal Counsel describe these units and show how to avoid pitfalls in dealing with them.