(NEXSTAR) – The Senior Citizen’s League is pretty confident that many seniors receiving Social Security benefits will be “disappointed” by next year’s cost-of-living increase.
In its latest projection, the senior advocacy group estimated that the 2026 cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) would amount to a 2.7% increase. This marks a bump over the increase that retirees saw in 2025 (2.5%), but it’s still not enough to cover the ever-rising costs of goods and services that seniors are paying, TSCL believes.
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“While a higher COLA would be welcome because their monthly benefits will increase, many will be disappointed,” Shannon Benton, the executive director of TSCL, was quoted as saying in a press release issued this week. “TSCL’s research shows that many seniors believe the COLA does not adequately capture the inflation they experience.”
The research Benton refers to includes a survey of nearly 2,000 beneficiaries. Of those participants, 94% said they felt this year’s COLA increase of 2.5% “was too low and that their monthly Social Security checks would fall behind.” The survey also indicated that 57 percent of seniors live on less than $2,000 per month, and a good chunk of that group (about a fifth) said they spent half that on healthcare costs alone…