The 3.6 percent cost-of-living adjustment, or COLA, will begin with the January 2012 benefit payment for Social Security recipients. For those receiving Supplemental Security Income, or SSI, the increased payments will begin on December 30, 2011. On average in the Northern Marianas retired workers on Social Security will get an extra $281 in 2012.
“This is good news for our manamko’ and others who receive help from the Social Security system,” said Congressman Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan.
“In 2010, Congress provided a cost-of-living payment of $250 for seniors in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
“We tried to do the same in 2011, but Republicans voted down the Seniors Protection Act.
“Now, however, with inflation up the COLA is automatic — and much needed.”
About 2,500 retirees, spouses, and disabled workers, as well as widows, widowers, and children of deceased retirees, receive monthly Social Security benefits in the Northern Marianas. In addition, 993 persons, who are blind or disabled, receive Supplemental Security Income benefits each month.
The average annual benefit for these two groups is around $6,500.
“This is not a lot of money,” Sablan said. “But it is absolutely necessary for many of our elderly and for people who have limited ability to work because of a disability. They need these payments to provide the basics: food, shelter, and clothing.
“This money is also very important to our local economy,” the congressman added.
“$22.6 million in benefits came into the Northern Marianas from Social Security in 2010. And the retirees spend all that money, so there is a powerful multiplier effect.”
This is the first cost-of-living adjustment since 2008. The official rate of inflation has been extremely low since then, so there has been no automatic increase in Social Security benefits.
But in passing the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act the Democrat-controlled Congress recognized that the official inflation rate did not truly represent the way prices were going up. So a one-time $250 payment for Social Security recipients was included in the Act, one of the first votes Sablan cast in Congress.
Last year, Democrats tried to get another $250 payment enacted in the Seniors Protection Act, but Republicans blocked the bill. Sablan was an original co-sponsor of that measure.
“Seeing gas prices shoot through the roof and other basic goods getting more and more expensive, it’s hard to believe that seniors don’t need a cost-of-living increase,” Sablan said.
“Plus, seniors have extra expenses for medicine and other health care needs; and those costs are not fully accounted in the overall inflation numbers.
“I wanted to see an increase for 2011, but at least our seniors and those who need help will now get a little more in 2012.”
More than 60 million Americans receive Social Security or Supplemental Security Income benefits. Workers who pay into the Social Security system for 40 quarters become eligible for a benefit when they reach retirement age.
The Covenant between the United States and the Northern Marianas provided that the Supplemental Security Income benefits would be available.
