Social security increase: What's the largest cost-of-living-adjustment Social Security ever paid?

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• Updated: May. 06, 2024, 3:17 p.m.|
• Published: May. 06, 2024, 10:48 a.m.

FILE - A Social Security card is displayed on Oct. 12, 2021, in Tigard, Ore. AP

Based on the current rate of inflation, Social Security recipients are on track to receive a cost-of-living adjustment increase of around 2.6% in 2025. That figure represents a boost of about $45 per month for the average beneficiary, lower than last year's 3.2% COLA which added an average of $50.

There have been years, however, where Social Security recipients have received no increase at all. Three years - two of which concurred consecutively - had no increase at all: 2009, 2010 and 2015. 2016′s increase was 0.3%.

READ MORE: Social security increase: Here's the smallest cost-of-living adjustment Social Security ever paid

2022′s 8.7% increase was the largest since 1981 when inflation pushed Social Security benefits up 11.2%. But the largest increase COLA was instituted was in 1975 was in 1980 with beneficiaries saw a 14.3% jump. Those higher figures were followed by increases below 5% until 1991 when it rose by 5.$%.

COLAs, designed to prevent benefits from being eroded by inflation, are determined by data from the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers which tracks the average price of a basket of goods. The average CPI-W for the third quarter of the previous year is compared to the third quarter of the current year and, if there is no increase, there is no COLA.

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If there is an increase in CPI-W, Social Security benefits will increase by the same percentage points.

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