Legislative Update: Representative Sanders Reintroduces CPI-E Bill

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Legislative Update: Representative Sanders Reintroduces CPI-E Bill

On May 25th, Representative Bernie Sanders (I-VT) reintroduced his bill to have the Social Security Administration use the CPI-E as the basis for the annual Cost of Living Adjustments. The bill, H.R. 2035 would mandate the use of the now experimental Consumer Price Index - Elderly (CPI-E) for all future COLA increases.

The CPI-E, which the Government has been keeping track of for more than 17 years, uses a `market basket` of goods and services that gives more emphasis or `weight` to what older Americans actually spend their money on - such as physician visits, medicines and health insurance.

If this bill is adopted, people drawing Social Security would see slightly higher COLA increases as it would be based on a better and more accurate gauge of their true expenses. While the annual increases under this improved formula would be modest, it is important to note that over time the increase compounds resulting in significantly improved long term benefits.

If you would like to write your Senator and Representative urging them to support legislation such as H.R. 2035, click the link below and, once there, select the Petition for a Fair Social Security COLA: http://action.tscl.org/FairAnnualSSCola.asp

To learn more about the CPI-E, click one of the headlines below:

This article first appeared in Volume 6, Issue 8 of "The Social Security and Medicare Advisor" newsletter (July/August/2001). To receive future editions of "The Advisor" in its special, free e-mail version, please click here.