Hold Harmless Has Come Back to Haunt Many Social Security Recipients

“Half of all seniors received none — or virtually nothing — extra as a result of Social Security’s 2% “raise” in 2018”

For better or worse, Social Security is arguably the most important social program in this country. Each and every month, the Social Security Administration (SSA) provides a benefit to more than 62 million people, which includes nearly 43 million retired workers. Of these almost 43 million retirees, more than 3 out of 5 lean on their monthly checks to provide at least half of their monthly incomes. In effect, Social Security has played a key role in keeping elderly poverty rates down. And the COLA is very important to each of them when it comes to inflation.

The importance of cost-of-living adjustments:

Given how extensively retirees lean on Social Security to make ends meet, there’s potentially nothing more important to current recipients than the annual cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) announcement in mid-October of each year.

COLA is nothing more than the “raise” that beneficiaries will receive in the upcoming year. It’s supposed to be representative of the inflation that Social Security beneficiaries face, but this isn’t always the case. In fact, Social Security’s inflationary tether that determines COLA is the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W).

As the name implies, it measures the spending habits of urban wage earners and clerical workers, which differ greatly from seniors, who spend far more on medical care and housing as a percentage of total expenditures than working-age Americans. This often results in seniors receiving a COLA that doesn’t adequately represent the inflation that they’re facing.

An analysis from The Senior Citizens League (TSCL) found that the purchasing power of Social Security dollars has declined by 30% just since the year 2000. What you formerly could buy for $100 in Social Security income back in 2000 now buys about $70 worth of those same goods and services.

But this is far from the only worry that a majority of seniors are facing this year. According to a recent survey published by TSCL, half of the more than 1,100 Social Security recipients it questioned received no COLA, or virtually no COLA, in 2018, despite an announced 2% “raise” by the Social Security Administration.

HOLD HARMLESS FOR SENIORS IS NOT WORKING AND NO ONE CARES: