I join Jill Schlesinger of CBS Moneywatch this weekend on Jill on Money to talk about the best age to file for Social Security benefits. Jill’s syndicated radio program airs in a variety of major markets, but you also can hear it online here. You’ll find the segment I taped with Jill on the first [...] [...more]
Now that the official Social Security cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) and Medicare Part B premiums have been announced for 2012, we can tote up the numbers to see how seniors will fare. All in all, the news is pretty good – a 3.6 percent COLA coupled with a much smaller-than-expected increase in the premium for Part [...] [...more]
After two years without an inflation adjustment, the Social Security Administration announced today that seniors will get a 3.6 percent cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) to their retirement benefits next year. That’s a sizable raise in this economy, and very welcome news to seniors hit hard by rising costs, slumping home equity and very low returns on [...] [...more]
“Starving the beast” is a favorite conservative strategy for forcing cuts in federal spending. The idea is to deprive the government of revenue in order to force spending cuts – and resistance to new taxes is a central feature of the current Super Committee deliberations in Washington. Advocates for older Americans are watching closely to [...] [...more]
Gov. Rick Perry wants to have a conversation about means-testing entitlements. This is a softer, gentler version of the governor’s earlier assertions that Social Security is an un-Constitutional Ponzi scheme. And Perry is hardly the only conservative floating the idea that wealthy seniors should get less Social Security — or none at all. Last week, [...] [...more]
