"Well ... how conveeeeeeenient."
Posted on 10/15/2009 6:18:17 AM PDT by rrstar96
WASHINGTON – The Social Security Administration makes it official Thursday: There will be no cost of living increase for Social Security recipients next year, the first year without one since automatic adjustments were adopted in 1975.
The announcement comes as President Barack Obama and key members of Congress call for a second round of $250 payments to more than 50 million seniors, veterans, retired railroad workers and people with disabilities.
The payments would be equal to about a 2 percent increase for the average Social Security recipient. The cost: $13 billion.
Obama called on Congress Wednesday to approve the payments, and several key members of Congress said they would.
"This additional assistance will be especially important in the coming months, as countless seniors and others have seen their retirement accounts and home values decline as a result of this economic crisis," Obama said in a statement.
Blame falling consumer prices for no automatic increase next year. By law, Social Security's cost-of-living adjustment, or COLA, is pegged to inflation, which was negative this year, due largely to falling energy costs.
The $250 payments would go to Social Security recipients as well as those receiving veterans benefits or disability benefits, railroad retirees and retired public employees who don't receive Social Security. Recipients would be limited to one payment, even if they qualified for more.
Obama said he would not allow the payments to come out of the Social Security trust funds and further erode the finances of the retirement program. Social Security already is projected to pay out more in benefits than it collects in taxes in each of the next two years.
However, Obama did not offer any alternatives to finance the payments. A senior administration official said Obama was open to borrowing the money, increasing the federal budget deficit. The official, who requested anonymity, was not authorized to speak on the record.
The $250 payments would match the ones issued to seniors earlier this year as part of the massive economic recovery package enacted in February. Those, too, were financed with borrowed money.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he supports sending out another round of payments, as did Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, which has jurisdiction over Social Security in the House.
Other lawmakers said Social Security recipients shouldn't get the extra payments because the formula doesn't call for it.
"I think it would be inappropriate," said Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H. "The reason we set up this process was to have the Social Security reimbursement reflect the cost of living."
Social Security payments increased by 5.8 percent in January, the largest increase since 1982. The big increase was largely because of a spike in energy costs in 2008.
Inflation has been negative this year as gasoline prices have dropped 30 percent and overall energy costs have dropped 23 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Social Security payments, however, cannot go down. The average monthly Social Security payment for all Social Security recipients is $1,094.
So old people hows that “hope and change” working out for you?!
BUYING senior’s votes one at a time.
“The Social Security Administration makes it official Thursday: There will be no cost of living increase for Social Security recipients next year, the first year without one since automatic adjustments were adopted in 1975.”
And the VA is not getting one this year....something about how “good” the economy is or some such nonsense.
And at bargain basement prices.
The first cut in SS. (It’ll start slow.)
A 2% or whatever COLA would be based on what you get each month which is supposedly based on what you contibuted thus those receiving higher paymnts would get more than those receiving lower. A $250 “bonus” going to everyone actullay means a progressive, I’d call it regressive, payout of a higher per cent to lower recipients than higher. Guess who is more likely to vote for Obama.
Buying my vote with my grandchildren’s money. My $250 will probaby cost each of them over $10,000.
By rights it shouldn’t make any difference if a Republican had won back in November. The COLA is based on a set of criteria that weren’t met, so no increase is called for. And even had McCain won last year I bet he’d be out there promoting his own $250 check or something similar to pander to the elderly.
"Well ... how conveeeeeeenient."
Nobody “buys” my vote.
Meanwhile, Congress gets their automatic pay raise...
In your eye you old farts!!
Ha ha ha ha!
Pretty good I guess. Obama is going to “give” you money even though you are not entitled to it.
Nothing to do with how good the economy is. It is because the gasoline and natural gas price bubbles from 2008 have burst. Energy is a certain percentage of the CPI and with many of those price down by about half, the CPI went down.
If anything it is a sign of how bad the economy is with a decline in demand for energy.
Can someone with hard data tell me if the SSTF actually has any cash reserves or is it a completely pay-as-you-go system right now? If it doesn't have any cash reserves, then where is the money going to come from to pay the shortfalls in SS over the next few years? We either crowd out other federal spending, raise taxes or monetize more debt.
“My $250 will probaby cost each of them over $10,000.”
$10,000.00 per year if they are lucky.
The elderly should not sell their votes next year for a puny $250. They should lobby for at least $1000. The Democrats can always print more money for this bribe in an election year. Of course, it may take $1000 to buy a loaf of bread and a gallon of milk when the inevitable inflation hits, but so what? We never think past the next election.
Probably true. SS is underfunded, as all ponzi schemes eventually become.
I would expect COLA for SS payments to become increasingly rare. Bush promised to revise SS with more private control of individual retirement funds, but met some rather heavy criticism and didn’t pursue it further.
However, as some poster noted earlier, the $250 payment favorably targets low income people. More wealth redistribution. Although we can only speculate what McCain might have done, I tend to think he would have pushed for emergency COLA relief rather than a uniform payment.
Doesn’t matter, those people will soon be dead under Obamacare.
In light of the typical liberal standard definition ... ...
Yep. As much as I can't stand Obama, this has nothing to do with him. I do, however, enjoy the prospect of my fellow greedy geezers marching on Washington protesting him because of this.
BTW - are we going to see any heart-wrenching anecdotes on the MSM nightly newscasts of those poooor elderly who are going to be eating dog food because they're not getting their yearly increase?
The reality is that SS has always been a pay as you go system. Here is the way it works. After all benefits are paid from the revenue collected by the payroll tax, the "surplus" is deposited into the General Fund and Treasury issues non-market, interest bearing T-bills in the amount of the surplus to the SS Trust Fund.
When SS goes into the red as it will for the next two years, the SSTF redeems T-bills in the amount of the deficit to pay for the benefits, i.e., the General Fund must come up with the money to redeem thte T-Bills. SS will go into the red permanently in 2016 and exhaust all of its SSTF T-bills in 2037. FYI: The SSTF is included in the National Debt under "Intragovernmental Holdings." The OASI Trust Fund contains about $2 Trillion and the DI Trust Fund has $200 billion.
A SUMMARY OF THE 2009 ANNUAL REPORTS -- Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees
I can't emphasize enough how stupid this country has become...
and so much blame to go around...from the NEA who keeps the country stupid, to the MSM who fosters it....
This crap is all going to come to a head soon....for good or ill.
Why would you expect that?
Hasn’t it always been the story that repubs are going to cut social security and end up losing elections over that issue? Now the dims are actually going to cut SS payments. Their media is nowhere on this.
Yeah. It’s important to take the “automatic” aspect out of it and instead hand them special $250 bonuses. That way they know who they should be grateful too.
Of course, by then, the Dollar may only be worth .001 cents.
Check out this article from 2004:
http://web.archive.org/web/20040627142700/eastandard.net/headlines/news26060403.htm
That I as a senior was getting tripled whammied by obamacare.
They must be getting hammered about the NO COLA raises.
Those of us on Tricare For Life (military health ins) + Medicare part B are going to get triple whammied with the cuts, increases in co-pays, and deductibles plus the taxes on medical devices seniors use most.
Zero and the demorats really cares for our senior citizens don't they....and NO pay raise for those of us on SS for the next 2 years, BUT congress gave themselves a hefty pay raise and MORE perk money.
This from a google search: http://economicspolitics.blogspot.com/2009/05/tricare-for-life-is-obama-trying-to.html
This option would help reduce the costs of TFL, as well as costs for Medicare, by introducing minimum out-of pocket requirements for beneficiaries. Under this option, TFL would not cover any of the first $525 of an enrollee’s cost-sharing liabilities for calendar year 2011 and would limit coverage to 50 percent of the next $4,725 in Medicare cost sharing that the beneficiary incurred. (Because all further cost sharing would be covered by TFL, enrollees could not pay more than $2,888 in cost sharing in that year.)
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99xx/doc9925/12-18-HealthOptions.pdf
That I as a senior was getting tripled whammied by obamacare.
They must be getting hammered about the NO COLA raises.
Those of us on Tricare For Life (military health ins) + Medicare part B are going to get triple whammied with the cuts, increases in co-pays, and deductibles plus the taxes on medical devices seniors use most.
Zero and the demorats really cares for our senior citizens don't they....and NO pay raise for those of us on SS for the next 2 years, BUT congress gave themselves a hefty pay raise and MORE perk money.
This from a google search: http://economicspolitics.blogspot.com/2009/05/tricare-for-life-is-obama-trying-to.html
This option would help reduce the costs of TFL, as well as costs for Medicare, by introducing minimum out-of pocket requirements for beneficiaries. Under this option, TFL would not cover any of the first $525 of an enrollee’s cost-sharing liabilities for calendar year 2011 and would limit coverage to 50 percent of the next $4,725 in Medicare cost sharing that the beneficiary incurred. (Because all further cost sharing would be covered by TFL, enrollees could not pay more than $2,888 in cost sharing in that year.)
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99xx/doc9925/12-18-HealthOptions.pdf
And remember that Billy Klintoon actually taxed your “Social Security”. Doncha just LUV them Dems.
Not really, its just the COLA number. They should simply follow the law. But the truth is they’re Dems—they can’t help but give away taxpayer $$.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find only things evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelogus
Yup, I know.
I was implying that this is 'mental preparation' for the cuts that will be necessary in the future.
This is the part that's kind of interesting. Where is the General Fund going to find the money especially given that tax revenues are declining? More taxes, more debt issuance?
U. S. House of Representatives
FReep away!
The entitlement programs represent almost a $60 trillion unfunded liability. And that is before ObamaCare. These programs will consume more than 70% of the federal budget by 2060. We are heading for a major train wreck within a decade.
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