No Social Security COLA in 2016

[agate]

There apparently won't be any automatic increase in Social Security benefit payments in 2016:

Only registered and activated users can see links., Click Here To Register...

[agate]

There's also this somewhat confusing information about Medicare premiums:

Only registered and activated users can see links., Click Here To Register...

[Cat Dancer]

I think basically the increase in the Part B section will only affect new recipients, and wealthy recipients. I think most of us regulars here have been on social security for awhile, and are lower income. I think. Maybe.

[SalpalSally]

There apparently won't be any automatic increase in Social Security benefit payments in 2016:

Only registered and activated users can see links., Click Here To Register...

The big stink pots!!!

[agate]

I think basically the increase in the Part B section will only affect new recipients, and wealthy recipients. I think most of us regulars here have been on social security for awhile, and are lower income. I think. Maybe.

That's what I'm getting out of it too but it's early in the day yet for me to be understanding anything.

[agate]

The big stink pots!!!

This bit of information from the Medicare Rights Center is sad:

Half of all people with Medicare are living on annual incomes of $24,150 or less.

[Howie]

It all makes my head hurt!

[Gary]

It all makes my head hurt!

And my pocket book too.

I find it interesting that the stuff that drove the COL down are items we buy less of anyway, like gasoline. And your portion of medical cost while it went up is not used in the computing of COLA's as it is too great a variable, huh? Either I pay it or I don't. Like cholesterol lowering meds I have ridiculously high numbers but the fact is on top of all the other meds I take I just cant afford it.

[SalpalSally]

[quote]This bit of information from the Medicare Rights Center is sad:

Half of all people with Medicare are living on annual incomes of $24,150 or less. [ quote]



Make that LESs in my case.

[renee]

I don't think I broke 15k this year.
Plllllpllplplplpl.

[Jeanie Z]

:) I have been living on $15,200.00 a year since I started drawing Social Security. My house and van are paid for or I would not make it. That figure stays the same and part of that is alimony and I appreciate my ex not minding paying it.

I first applied for disability in 1988 when I was 47 but never got it. My ex gave me money to live on and we stayed married on paper for several years so I could have insurance. In 1991 we divorced as he wanted to marry and I had to pay all my own medical from the money he gave me and some months it was almost impossible and I had to ask him for some extra money.

What really irritates me is that congress has spent money out of the SS trust which was never intended to be used for anything other than payouts to people. Also all the people who pay in for years and die before ever drawing out any money. Social Security should have enough money to last for ages if congress had not depleted so much. Jeanie :)

[agate]

I live on $12,500 a year but wouldn't manage without subsidized housing. Has anyone noticed that the cost of housing has been getting ridiculous?

[SalpalSally]

My SS in only a poultry 14000.
Spending down till Medicaid.

[renee]

Wow, I feel like I am in the best company here!

I am hard-wired to live at or below my means which has enabled me to do
extravagant things I want to do.

Yes Agate, the cost of housing in my area is horrible and getting worse.
Boomtown syndrome.
If I wasn't in public housing I could not live here where I have lived and
made friends for 40 years.
Then again if I didn't live in this apartment I would be warm.

It's a trade off.

8>)

[Howie]

Agate, I live on the same amount as you. But when my parents passed, what I inherited allowed me to buy this mobile home, my PT Cruiser, a metal garage, and put a bunch into my Karmann Ghia. So I used my inheritance to set myself up to be able to live on just my SS.