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| "And the Blows Just Keep on Coming" SSA Announces No COLA for 2011 And the blows just keep on coming. This week the Social Security Administration announced that for the second year in a row there will be no cost-of- living adjustment (COLA). Florida’s 5th Congressional District is home to over 250,000 recipients of Social Security and I have made it my priority to ensure that seniors receive the benefits they deserve and a fair cost-of-living adjustment is part of that commitment. It only seems right that with the cost of everything going up, your Social Security benefits should be adjusted accordingly. Sadly, President Obama disagrees. We all know that seniors have different spending priorities and in order to put an end to this unfair treatment, I support H.R. 2365, the Consumer Price Index for Elderly Consumers Act of 2009. This legislation would use the CPI-E (the Experimental Consumer Price Index for Americans 62 Years of Age and Older) to calculate the Social Security COLA instead of the current formula. For example, the CPI-E would more accurately calculate inflation by giving greater weight to expenses like healthcare, which tend to be greater for seniors. You also might have heard that while you are under pressure to make ends meet, Members of Congress are enjoying a generous 2.8% raise. Like your COLA, Congressional salaries are adjusted automatically; however Congress should not even be thinking about taking a pay raise when we have a $13 trillion deficit and an unemployment rate climbing to 10%. I have voted against this pay raise consistently over the years and I am happy to see that the Democrat Majority finally got the message and stopped it for this year. Frankly, this sort of thing is precisely why Americans think Washington is out of touch. In my opinion, they are right.
Thank you,
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Saturday, October 16, 2010
On the Hill, Off the Cuff: "And the Blows Just Keep on Coming: SSA Announces No COLA for 2011"
