Brandon made the cost of living way too high. But his Drive By Media will say Brandon is helping boomers.
Much of the COLA could be canceled out by any rise in Medicare Part B premiums. We have yet to hear anything on this, but medical costs continue to skyrocket. At some point they’ll have to raise Medicare premiums. There’s no way out unless they print up more dollars and continue to increase the national debt.
Left unsaid but lurking like the legendary light in the tunnel ... the coming exhaustion of the Social Security Trust Fund in 2030s. In spite of 2000 VP Al Gore’s LIE, there NEVER was nor has been a ‘lock’ on the Fund and it is running out of money since the 1960s.
If there is not action on the funding end or change of Federal Law, sometime around 2034 (current 2021 SS Trustees Report), all SS payments will have a haircut of ~30%. However if we continue with this inflation and the current payments increase at the 9-11% level, how can this not drain the Social Security Trust Fund that much QUICKER?
Yes, it is likely that the funding would be supplemented by the General Treasury but what does that say about our hapless, feckless US Government over the past 30+ years that this train wreck has been coming? And EQUALLY YES, this disaster has the ‘D’onkey Party written all over it!
Way back in the Reagan era, Chairman Dan Rostenkowski (D-IL) [House Ways and Means] spoke the ugly political truth that all ‘D’ Chicago Pols learned from the start; “You stay in office by giving money to your voters. You delay paying for it until you are out of office!”
PS: In civilian life this is a Ponzi Scheme! In government, this is practical politics!
If they any intent of treating it as a trust fund, FICA would have gone to 8% decades ago.
Interesting that they make it three weeks before elections.
I’m going against the current of this thread...
I don’t see Demoncrat politicians nor demoncrat deep state tools being unaware of the consequences of pissing off old people who stridently vote - nor doing it right before the mid-term elections.
I believe this impending potential destruction will inform their decision.
My 2 cents.
Social Security has been a ticking timebomb for decades. That led me to arranging my finances so I could still have a very comfortable lifestyle even if it went away completely. There was no way I was going to count on the politicians in DC to act in the best interests of the American people.
Whatever the increase is there will be a concurrent and offsetting increase in medicare. No net gain.
It’s supposed to be a cost of living equalizer but if you’re on foodstamps, those get reduced to account for the “raise”.