Below is the full Cost Of Living Adjustment (COLA) announcement from Social Social. It includes Maximum Taxable Earnings, income required for a Quarter of Coverage, Retirement Earnings Test (for those under Full Retirement Age), and the new Supplemental Security Income payment amounts, among other things. Note that they include the SSI Resource Limits and Income Exclusions even those have NEVER been adjusted for inflation and are absurdly out of date.
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The thresholds for taxability of Social Security benefits are also not adjusted for inflation. Only high income people used to have some of their benefits taxed, but with inflation I think the majority of people on Social Security now pay these taxes. This can easily result in marginal tax rates that are 50% or 85% higher than the bracket amount (so in the 10% bracket, you could pay 15% or 18.5%, since each extra dollar of non-Social Security income makes another $0.50 of benefits taxable if taxable income plus half of yearly Social Security is over $25,000, and $0.85 if it is above $34,000).
ReplyDeleteThe announcement says that the full retirement age is 66. That is not correct - the FRA for each person depends on his or her year of birth. I assume they mean that for people reaching FRA in 2019, their FRA is 66, but why not give the FRA for people first eligible in 2019? Their benefit level depends on their FRA, and a lot of people get benefits in their first year.
No COLA for fee agreement Cap. I guess we attorneys are presumed to live in our own separate world which is immune from inflation. The only COLA for us is a watered down soda.
ReplyDelete11:39 then practice in another area of law more lucrative, lets face it this is admin law and a bit see spot run, so you get what you work for, they even let non attys do it and the win rates are not that much different.
ReplyDelete10:37 your thinking is why the quality of representation is allowed to be poor. If the fee cap was moved to $10k tomorrow you would have higher quality representation without a doubt as the pressure on the old guard reps would be massive as the amount of lawyers from other practice areas would move in. The crème rises to the top.
ReplyDeleteThe Medicare Part B standard premium for 2019 has been announced, and it is $135.50, only a small increase from last year's $134. Many people have been paying less due to past low COLA's, but they average $130/month. So they will go to the full amount, but that's just $5.50 more, so unlike last year, these people will keep most of their COLA.
ReplyDelete@5:11 if it was raised to $10k the same people would be doing it and posting here Friday how horrible the payout is!!!
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