TSCL is not the only organization to warn about the prospect of another extremely low COLA next year. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) in its latest budget report projected that next year's COLA would be 1.6%. Seniors depend on COLAS to protect the buying power of benefits from rising costs over retirement, which can last as long as 25 or 30 years. But over the past five years, COLAs have been at record lows, averaging only 1.4% after averaging about 4% per year since COLAs became automatic in 1975. .Early this week, the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) for the Social Security Administration released a 10-year study that found nearly billion in overpayments to around 4 million enrollees in the Disability Insurance program. Approximately 45 percent of all disabled beneficiaries have been overpaid in the past decade, the report's authors concluded. .This week, one new cosponsor – Rep. Suzan DelBene (WA-1) – signed on to Rep. Peter DeFazio's (OR-4) No Loopholes in Social Security Taxes Act (H.R. 1029), bringing the total up to thirty-one. If signed into law, the bill would extend the solvency of the Social Security Trust Fund by subjecting all income over 0,000 to the Social Security payroll tax. Currently, the payroll tax cap sits at 7,000, and no income over that amount is taxed. .Marvin Moser, MD author of "The Patient As A Consumer" Yale University School of Medicine Heart Book, provides these eight questions to ask: .The Senate-passed bill includes a repeal of the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate, which experts predict will result in a loss of health insurance coverage for 4 million individuals, many of whom are older Americans who are not yet eligible for Medicare. Those who remain insured through the individual market are expected to see premium increases of 10 percent or more – a hike that would make health insurance unaffordable for many. Most House Republicans have said they support a repeal of the mandate, and it is expected to be included in the final version of the bill. .House Leaders Propose ACA Replacement .In a recent high profile Medicare fraud takedown, actor and entrepreneur Roberto F. Marrero, who played bits parts on Miami Vice, America's Most Wanted, and Unsolved Mysteries, was arrested for massive Medicare fraud. Marrero, who became a Medicare-licensed healthcare provider in 2007, is accused of submitting million in bogus bills for supplying purported home healthcare services for diabetic patients. .We had no way to tell how much worse these scams were about to become. As a result of this pandemic, our legislative efforts must evolve just as these scams have. .This week, just hours ahead of the December 9th deadline, lawmakers in the House passed legislation to avoid a government shutdown and left town for the remainder of the year. They are expected to return to Capitol Hill on January 3, 2017 to begin the 115th Congress.