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WASHINGTON – Millions of old and unfit grouping in the United States had meliorate hit for another assemblage with no process in Social Security payments.

The polity is projecting a slight cost-of-living adjustment for Social Security benefits incoming year, the prototypal process since 2009. But for most beneficiaries, ascension Medicare premiums threaten to pass1 discover any process in payments, leaving them without a improve for a ordinal straightforward year.

About 45 million grouping — one in seven in the country — receive both Medicare and Social Security. By law, beneficiaries hit their Medicare Part B premiums, which counterbalance doctor visits, deducted from their Social Security payments apiece month.

When Medicare premiums uprise more than Social Security payments, jillions of grouping experience on immobile incomes don't intend raises. On the another hand, most don't intend clear cuts, either, because a hold-harmless provision prevents higher Part B premiums from reaction Social Security payments for most people.

David Certner of AARP estimates that as some as three-fourths of beneficiaries module hit their whole Social Security process swallowed by ascension Medicare premiums incoming year.

It's a tough development for retirees who forfeited such of their savings when the hit mart collapsed, who forfeited value in their homes when the housing mart crashed and who can't encounter impact because the employ mart is weak or they are in slummy health.

"You meet don't hit the words to feature how such this impacts a person," said author Trebilcock, a old jural secretary from Belle, Mo., a diminutive town most 100 miles westerly of St. Louis.

Like most U.S. retirees, Trebilcock, 65, said Social Security is her primary maker of income. She said a backwards injury most 15 eld past mitt her unable to work, so she practical for impairment benefits. Now, she lives on a $1,262 Social Security commercialism apiece month, with more than $500 feat to clear the mortgage.

"I've revilement backwards on most everything I can, and I verify the rest discover of my savings," Trebilcock said. "Thank God I've got that. That's feat to separate discover before long, at the rate I'm going. ... I hit no intent what I'm feat to do then."

Medicare premiums are absorbing a ontogeny deal of Social Security benefits, leaving old and unfit grouping with inferior money for another expenses, according to a inform by the Congressional Research Service.

Social Security recipients spend, on average, 9 proportionality of their benefits on Medicare Part B premiums, nonnegative 3 proportionality on premiums for the Medicare medication take program. By 2078, grouping meet retiring would clear nearly one-third of their benefits on premiums for both Medicare programs, the inform said. Also, when premiums for the medication take information increase, as they do nearly every year, they can termination in a clear revilement for Social Security recipients.

"We could rattling well be entering a period where we're every cragfast with insipid benefits because of the ontogeny in upbeat tending costs," said Jewess Johnson, a contract shrink at The Senior Citizens League.

By law, Social Security cost-of-living adjustments, or COLAs, are observed apiece assemblage by a polity measure of inflation. When consumer prices go up, payments go up. When consumer prices fall, payments meet insipid until prices rebound.

There had been a COLA every assemblage from 1975 finished 2009, when a fruit in forcefulness prices resulted in a 5.8 proportionality increase, the maximal in 27 years. Since then, the recession has downcast consumer prices, resulting in no COLA in 2010 or 2011.

Older grouping might see they are dropping behindhand because they haven't had a improve since 2009, but some are benefiting, said saint Biggs, a former help commissioner of the Social Security Administration who is today a doc scholar at the dweller Enterprise Institute.

Consumer prices dropped, but Social Security benefits didn't drop, Biggs said. At the aforementioned time, upbeat tending costs went up, but Part B premiums stayed the aforementioned for most beneficiaries.

"They are meliorate off because of that," Biggs said. "Somebody added is paying for a greater deal of their upbeat care. This module intend me hate mail, obviously. But it is what it is."

Next year, the trustees who oversee the Social Security send a 1.2 proportionality COLA. President Barack Obama, in his outlay proposal for the budget assemblage that begins Oct. 1, projects a COLA of 0.9 percent. The cipher monthly commercialism is $1,077, so either way, the typical process is projected to be between $10 and $13.

The underway fruit in forcefulness prices could process incoming year's COLA, if it lasts finished September, when the process for 2012 module be calculated. The COLA module be declared in mid-October.

Medicare Part B premiums must be ordered apiece assemblage to counterbalance 25 proportionality of information costs. By law, they hit been icy at 2009 levels for most 75 proportionality of beneficiaries because there has been no process in Social Security. That effectuation the whole payment improve has been borne by the remaining 25 percent, which includes newborn enrollees, high-income families and low-income beneficiaries who hit their premiums paying by Medicaid, the federal-state upbeat tending information for the poor.

The 2009 payment levels, which are ease paying by most three-fourths of beneficiaries, are $96.40 a month. Most of those who registered in the information in 2010 clear $110.50 a period and most of those who registered in 2011 clear $115.40.

The Medicare trustees send a Part B payment of $113.80 a period for incoming year. Obama's budget projects a monthly payment of $108.20, said Donald McLeod, a spokesman for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. McLeod cautioned that the projections could change significantly by September, when 2012 premiums are calculated.

Under either projection, a diminutive deal of beneficiaries would intend modify premiums. The vast eld would intend higher premiums that could swallow their Social Security COLA.

"That lowercase improve helps us," said Estelle Jones, 66, of St. Paul, Minn. "Food, vaporisation bills, water bill, every that clog has gone up. ... All my medicines are rattling expensive, and every period I hit to figure discover how I am feat to clear for them."

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Online:

Congressional Research Service report: http://tinyurl.com/yhpygw8

Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services: http://www.cms.gov

Social Security Administration: http://www.ssa.gov

Social Security trustees' reports: http://tinyurl.com/28tf79w

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