AARP holds a discussion on how changes to the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) will impact federal benefits, and how the federal government measures the cost of living.
A panel of experts -- from the Social Security Administration, the Center for Economic Policy and Research, the American Enterprise Institute, Community Legal Services, and the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America -- will identify what groups might be impacted by a COLA change and the potential fallout for those groups. They will also weigh the effect on social security beneficiaries over time by using two proposed new CPI measures: Chained CPI or the CPI-E.
The federal government uses the Consumer Price Index (CPI) to regularly increase benefits from social security and other federal programs. However using either Chained CPI or CPI-E will affect benefit levels and the tens of millions of Americans who rely on those benefits.