My SS went down by about $120 per month for 2017.
Now that is because I was foolish enough to believe in the once-popular idea of a 3-legged stool to support my retirement. SS, pension and personal savings. Even the SS people wrote about that concept and promoted it heavily.
No, the SS itself didn't go down, it increased by a few dollars, but the Medicare that I am forced to take went up by enough so that the net check is $120 less than 2016.
While I was working, SS was touted a a sacred obligation of the government, workers pay into it while they are young and the government guarantees to support them when they are old. Well that turn out to be a big load of smelly Obama.
I remember those Democrat editorial cartoons showing Bush pushing grandma down the stairs when he proposed allowing workers to use just ten percent of their SS tax to invest in government approved securities to enhance their retirement. They accused him of wanting to strip them of their SS retirement funds.