When will social security recipients get an extra $200 a month in 2023

Q: Is Social Security getting extra money this month?

And while you wont see a benefits increase on your check this month or for the rest of 2022, you can expect a higher amount on your checks starting in 2023. Those who receive Supplemental Security Income will see an increase starting in December.

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How much will my Social Security check increase in 2023?
Will Social Security recipients get an extra $200 a month in 2023?
Is Social Security getting extra money this month?
Will disability benefits increase in 2023?

The last two years the COLA increase was 5.9%. There has not been a double-digit COLA increase since 1982 when there was an 11.2% increase. (AP Photo/Jenny Kane, File)AP

Kristin F. Dalton |

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Social Security recipients will soon find out how much of a monthly increase they can expect as the Social Security Administration is giving its biggest increase in decades.

On Thursday, Oct.13, the Social Security Administration (SSA) is expected to announce its 2023 cost-of-living (COLA) adjustment.

Next year’s COLA increase, the largest since 1980s, is to help offset record-high inflation levels and the amount of the increase is based on third-quarter data from the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W).

The nonpartisan Senior Citizens League estimated the COLA increase could be as much as 10.5%.

Currently, Social Security recipients receive an average of $1,542.22 per month; if the COLA increase is 10.5%, recipients would get approximately $175.10 extra monthly.

The last two years the COLA increase was 5.9%. There has not been a double-digit COLA increase since 1982 when there was an 11.2% increase.

The potentially significant increase comes at a time when inflation rates in all consumer markets are soaring, but also at a time when the future of Social Security benefits are in jeopardy.

It’s projected that Americans will stop receiving their full Social Security benefits in 2035 if lawmakers don’t act, according to a report released by the Social Security and Medicare trustees.

BILL INTRODUCED THAT WOULD RAISE MONTHLY PAYMENTS BY $200

Introduced in June by Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Oregon) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), the Social Security Expansion Act would give beneficiaries an additional 12% each month -- $200 per month -- totaling $2,400 annually.

Anyone who is a current Social Security recipient eligible in 2023 – at least 62 years old – would receive the bonus check.

“I am proud that the Social Security Administration has estimated that our legislation to expand Social Security benefits by $2,400 a year will fully fund Social Security for the next 75 years by applying the payroll tax on all income – including capital gains – above $250,000 a year,” Sanders said.

The bill would boost benefits for the lowest income earners in the U.S. under the Special Minimum Benefit program. Current recipients receive approximately $900 per month, according to the Social Security Administration. The proposed legislation would adjust the rate to 125% of the federal poverty line, increasing the monthly check to an estimated $1,400 per month.

It would also increase payroll taxes for some earners; currently earnings above $147,000 are not subjected to Social Security taxes, but the bill would change it so all earnings at or above $250,000 are taxed. Lawmakers said more than 93% of households would not see a change in how their income is taxed and would not be raised.

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(NEXSTAR) – The Social Security Administration is getting ready to announce the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for Social Security beneficiaries in 2023, and it’s expected to be a sizable increase.

The adjustments, which are designed to help Social Security and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments keep pace with inflation, are calculated each year based on recent increases in the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W), which itself is one of several price indexes calculated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The CPI-W, essentially, is a measure of the change in prices “for a market basket of consumer goods and services,” the BLS writes.

Based on recent CPI-W data, the COLA adjustment for 2023 is expected to be one of the largest in decades: the nonprofit Senior Citizen’s League most recently projected an 8.7% increase in benefits based on the latest CPI-W.

At such an adjustment, the average retiree benefit — $1,656 — would increase by $144.10.

“A COLA of 8.7% is extremely rare and would be the highest ever received by most Social Security beneficiaries alive today,” writes Mary Johnson, the Social Security and Medicare policy analyst for the Senior Citizens League, in a press release issued mid-September.

Beneficiaries can expect an official announcement on 2023’s COLA increase in mid-October — specifically the 13th, according to the Senior Citizen’s League. The date also coincides with the release of the Consumer Price Index for Sept. 2022. (The Social Security Administration pointed to the BLS’ online schedule for all release dates.)

Despite an announcement later this month, the increased benefits wouldn’t take effect for the country’s roughly 66 million Social Security beneficiaries until January 2023. Those receiving SSI always see their first adjusted benefits near the end of December in the previous calendar year.

The Social Security Administration had recently estimated that Social Security benefits make up a collective 30% of the income of elderly Americans. It’s a sizable chunk, though the Senior Citizen’s League worries that 2023’s projected COLA increase, at an estimated 8.7%, is still not enough to address most seniors’ needs.

Johnson, of the Senior Citizen’s League, had argued that the CPI-W does not specifically take into account the spending habits of those “62 and up,” and “gives greater weight to gasoline and transportation costs,” which are not top concerns for seniors.

So when gasoline prices began to fall, the CPI-W fell with it. And 2023’s projected COLA increase — which was estimated at 9.6% in August — decreased to a projected 8.7%.

“Across the board, retired and disabled Social Security recipients spend a bigger portion of their incomes on healthcare costs, housing, and food and less on gasoline,” Johnson wrote in mid-September. “Over the past 12 months, they rank food costs as their fastest growing expenditure, housing, and transportation in that order.”

Still, 2023’s COLA increase is significantly higher than 2022’s (5.9%) and the biggest since 1981, when beneficiaries received an 11.2% adjustment. Some years, however, the COLA was 0%.

“The buying power of Social Security benefits has occasionally improved in the past but that may not be enough when retirees have spent down their savings to stay afloat in years when inflation was going up,” Johnson wrote.

Social Security benefits will go up by more than $140 per month on average in 2023, as a record 8.7% cost-of-living adjustment kicks in. Exactly how much of an increase the approximately 70 million Americans who rely on the program for income will see will vary.

Under terms of the bill, anyone who is a current Social Security recipient or who will turn 62 in 2023 would receive an extra $200 in each monthly check.

And while you won't see a benefits increase on your check this month or for the rest of 2022, you can expect a higher amount on your checks starting in 2023. Those who receive Supplemental Security Income will see an increase starting in December.

Will disability benefits increase in 2023?

According to the Social Security Administration (SSA), the 2023 COLA will increase the average monthly SSDI benefit for a disabled worker by $119, from $1,364 to $1,483.