Social Security COLA for 2008 amounts to $24 a month

The federal government has announced that the nation's 50 million Social Security recipients will receive a whopping 2.3 percent cost-of-living increase for 2008.

That comes to about $24 more a month for the typical Social Security recipient. This is supposed to cover the cost of living?

What country did the Social Security Administration use as the basis for the COLA figure? Mongolia? Last time I looked, gas prices, food prices and the cost of utilities have gone through the roof in the United States.

And let's not even bring up the cost of medical care. How is anyone supposed to live on $1,079 a month, which is what the typical Social Security recipient will receive in 2008?

The Associated Press reports that the 2.3 percent COLA for 2008 is the smallest since a 2.1 percent boost in 2004 and is a full percentage point lower than the 3.3 percent adjustment for 2007.

The government has figured out another way to screw retirees (beyond the Social Security system itself).

The COLA adjustment is based on the change in consumer prices from this July through September compared with the same three-month period last year.

In the past two years, retirees have benefited from the timeframe the government uses to set the adjustment for the next year, the Associated Press reports. The 2006 increase picked up a jump in energy prices from that occurred in September 2005, reflecting the impact of Hurricane Katrina on production at Gulf Coast refineries, according to the wire service.

This year retirees get screwed because energy costs are spiking in the fall after remaining relatively level over the summer months.

"Retirees are going to feel a disconnect this year between the COLA increase and the reality of the inflation they face," Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com, told the AP. "If this calculation were done in another three months, it would be measurably higher."

And even more bad news for senior citizens: Part of the Social Security increase will be eaten up by a rise in the cost of Medicare, the health care program that covers the elderly and disabled, according to the AP.

The government announced earlier this month that Medicare premiums will rise 3.1 percent next year, which comes to $2.50 to $96.40 per month.

President Bush tried to reform Social Security a couple of years ago, but was rebuffed by the Democrats in Congress, who scared the bejesus out of senior citizens (even though Bush's plan would not have touched benefits for anyone currently retired.)

The chickens are coming home to roost. The Social Security system is headed for a monumental crash. We're two years closer to that collapse thanks to the Democrats in Congress.

Congressional Democrats have stuck their heads in the sand on the Social Security mess. And if Democrats win the White House in 2008, they will inherit the problem they largely helped create.


(Cartoon by Robert Arial, The State)