No Cost-of-Living Increase for Social Security Recipients This Year, Or Next

In effect, many seniors’ checks will shrink:

By law, Social Security benefits cannot go down. Nevertheless, monthly payments would drop for millions of people in the Medicare prescription drug program because the premiums, which often are deducted from Social Security payments, are scheduled to go up slightly.

“I will promise you, they count on that COLA,” said Barbara Kennelly, a former Democratic congresswoman from Connecticut who now heads the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare. “To some people, it might not be a big deal. But to seniors, especially with their health care costs, it is a big deal.”

The decision to freeze Social Security payments is being justified by the fact that yearly cost-of-living increases are pegged to inflation, and inflation this year is below zero — but that is largely due to lower energy prices, and that’s not where seniors spend most of their income:

Cost of living adjustments are pegged to inflation, which has been negative this year, largely because energy prices are below 2008 levels.

Advocates say older people still face higher prices because they spend a disproportionate amount of their income on health care, where costs rise faster than inflation. Many also have suffered from declining home values and shrinking stock portfolios just as they are relying on those assets for income.

The wise folks at conservative headquarters central (aka the American Enterprise Institute) say those silly old people are just getting themselves all in a tizzy over nothing:

“Seniors may perceive that they are being hurt because there is no COLA, but they are in fact not getting hurt,” said Andrew G. Biggs, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington think tank. “Congress has to be able to tell people they are not getting everything they want.” [Link added.]