Retiree checks to see 1.3% rise in 2021
WASHINGTON » Social Security recipients will get a modest 1.3% cost- of living-increase in 2021, but that might be small comfort amid worries about the coronavirus and its consequences for older people.
The increase amounts to $20 a month for the average retired worker, according to estimates released Tuesday by the Social Security Administration. That’s a little less than this year’s 1.6% cost- of-living adjustment, or COLA.
The COLA affects the personal finances of about 1 in 5 Americans, including Social Security recipients, disabled veterans and federal retirees, some 70 million people in all.
The economic fallout from the virus has reduced tax collections for Social Security and Medicare, likely worsening their long-term financial condition. But there’s been no real discussion of either program in the personally charged election contest between President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden.
“It’s very difficult to talk about anything policy-wise,” said Mary Johnson, an analyst with the nonpartisan Senior Citizens League. “We are looking at a period where there are growing inadequacies in Social Security benefits, particularly for people with lower-to-middle benefits.”
With the just-announced COLA, the estimated average Social Security payment for a retired worker will be $1,543 amonth next year. A typical couple’s benefits would increase $33 to $2,596 per month.
“The guaranteed benefits provided by Social Security and the COLA increase are more crucial than ever as millions of Americans continue to face the one-two punch of the coronavirus’s health and economic consequences,” said AARP CEO Jo Ann Jenkins.
But Diana Lacroix, of Omaha, Nebraska, says her COLA doesn’t cushion rising health care costs most years. And she has new responsibilities. Her youngest daughter and two grandsons moved in with her this summer after the daughter’s landlord decided to sell the house they were renting.
Lacroix, retired from customer service jobs, is now buying diapers some days as she scrounges for good deals on hand sanitizer. “Something’s got to give,” she said. “Something’s got to change.”
People 65 and older went for Trump in 2016, but this election some polls show Biden even with Trump among older voters, or ahead.