Changes are coming to Social Security benefits: Here’s what to expect

In just a few weeks, nearly 73 million people receiving Social Security benefits will learn of a change coming to their payments.

Every year, the Social Security Administration assesses a Cost Of Living Adjustment which is announced in October and then put into effect the following January.

According to the Social Security Administration , the actual increase is determined by the percentage increase in the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W) from July to September of the current year.

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While the official COLA increase has not been announced for 2026 yet, bi-partisan group T he Senior Citizens League , predicts the increase will be about 2.7% , which is slightly up from 2025's increase of 2.5%.

The official COLA increase for 2026 won't be announced until Oct. 15 , but TSCL prediction is a close indicator of what it might look like as its uses the same calculation method as the SSA.

"From a historical perspective, the predicted 2026 COLA would rank 29th among the COLAs implemented since 1977, which was the first year that the SSA began calculating COLAs based on the CPI-W," TSCL wrote in a release .

"The last COLA, implemented in 2025, currently ranks 33rd."

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A 2.7% COLA would pan out to about an extra $54 per month for the average retired worker, increasing monthly from $2,008 to $2,062.

However, TSCL claims a 2.7% increase does not keep up with the inflation senior citizens are facing, pointing out the increase may be eroded by the projected increase in Medicare Part B premium, which may go up 11.5%, according to a trustees report .

"Right now, the government calculates each year's COLA by taking the average of the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners, or the CPI-W, from July to September of each year," TSCL wrote in a prediction .

"... The problem is that the CPI-W measures changes in prices for urban wage earners, whose budgets look a lot different than a typical senior's."

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