As expected, there will be no Cost Of Living Adjustment (COLA) this year for Social Security recipients. This is the third time this has happened since 2010. It had never happened before 2010.
Unfortunately, unless there's a change in the law, Medicare premiums will be increasing dramatically for almost one-third of Social Security recipients. Since the Medicare premiums are deducted from Social Security benefits that means that a lot of Social Security recipients will see a significant drop in the payments they receive.
Unfortunately, unless there's a change in the law, Medicare premiums will be increasing dramatically for almost one-third of Social Security recipients. Since the Medicare premiums are deducted from Social Security benefits that means that a lot of Social Security recipients will see a significant drop in the payments they receive.
12 comments:
SSA has now made it official (the article attributes it to the 'government', because the writer correctly used the CPI-W released by BLS to calculate that there would be no COLA rather than waiting for the SSA release). The contribution and benefit base (the cap) did not increase because it is not allowed to when there is no COLA (so it's still $118,500 next year). It normally goes up with the Average Wage Index (AWI), which did increase by 3.55% (the change from 2013 to 2014, the latter of which was just released). The increase in the AWI was a little larger than projected in the Trustees Report, and will mean that people turning 62 in 2016 will get benefits that are a little larger than they would have been under the projection (benefits are closely related to the AWI in the year a person turns 60).
Thank a Boomer.
Can we please stop the "boomer" comments where they have nearly zero relevance to the issue at hand?
COLA is zero because the methodology used to calculate COLA gives you an increase of zero this year.
Not "because Boomer".
"Since the Medicare premiums are deducted from Social Security benefits that means that a lot of Social Security recipients will see a significant drop in the payments they receive." - Charles you know better than this!
No benefit will decrease because of a Medicare increase. The Hold Harmless law will keep Medicare Part B at $104.90 for 70% of beneficiaries. The 30% paying the higher amount are individuals starting their Part B after January and those individuals subject to higher premiums because of IRRMA.
Funny how COLA is calculated on none of the things that people on benefits have to pay for. Drug cost, food cost, rent cost, health insurance costs, while programs for utility assistance are cut.
The argument is that people will buy apples when grapes are too expensive. Funny, try getting that ingrown toenail done instead of that tripple bypass and let me know how it works out.
Increased permiums for Part D plans, increased prices for supplemental insurances, states changing the rules to stop people from being eligible for QMB. How is the price of Strongheart and Alpo these days?
So when does it happen? When does the cost of Medicare Part B premiums take 25% of the average retirement? $1328 as a average retirement payment and $154 for Part B.
Is there anything being looked at to stop the Part B premium from becoming more than a certain percentage of benefits? Anybody else seeing this? Scares me!
I thank the bush administration and those who elected george bush. To be fair or objective,the obama administration has failed to reverse everything related to George bush's recession. I hope president clinton will do better.
Also note that not only did the CPI-W not increase from the third-quarter average of 2014 to the third-quarter average of 2015, it decreased by about four-tenths of one percent. So I believe any COLA for 2016 will be based on the increase of the third-quarter average for 2016 versus the third-quarter average for 2014, upon which the last COLA was calculated, and not 2015.
You are correct - the next COLA will be determined from the change in CPI-W from July-September 2014 to the same months in 2016. So we're starting out in the hole.
Obama could have changed anything he wanted during the first 2 years of his reign. If he wasn't happy with ANYTHING the Republicans had done he COULD have changed it. He didn't. Ask your Democrat/Liberal friends why he didn't.
In regards to the above comment. President obama was elected in 2008 to reverse george bush's recession. That was issue #1. I hope all those wrinkly faced republican seniors who hate latinos,blacks and others are satisfied with their republican conservative congress and senate and hope they are satisfied with their benefits if trump is president because they are getting what they deserve for electing republicans.
The boomers who get blamed for everything that goes boom financially ARE the one generation that created this country's greatest largess financially. I am tired of those who want to blame boomers for everything when we earned the most for this country and for that we should be given our miserly benefits without passing more policy in figuring out how to take away more of the "oh get on my knees and say thank yo", stipend, a whole lot less than what we put in since the 60's and the interest that was made. Blame the republicans who make the decisions on who will get what or when. They really like the American workers so much that they screw them for corporations who give them donations, campaign contributions and curried favors for themselves, their buddies and family members and all besides other than, what the republicans already PROFIT FROM WALL ST where EVERYTHING IS FOR SALE, EVERYTHING which btw, this wasn't the case in the 60's which were the last of the many decades of democratic working socialized society. Come up with a social program that makes promises, take the money from the paycheck and then fight like hell for years to get a little of it back and that is after you are called a fraud. That's the republican's idea of American retirement after working most of your life. So how much do the republican congrsss get when they retire from working so hard in screwing most of us out of OUR OWN SSA BENEFITS?
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