When Barack Obama boasts about how well his administration did, you can see for yourself with  the cost of living adjustment (COLA) increases for Social Security (S.S.) recipients.  If 2009 looks good, that is a reflection of the country's finances in 2008, the last year of the Bush administration.  Obama took office in January 2009, which is when the new COLA numbers started to run.

Automatic Cost of Living Adjustments

• January 2009 – 5.8%
• January 2010 – 0.0%
• January 2011 – 0.0%
• January 2012 – 3.6%
• January 2013 – 1.7%
• January 2014 – 1.5%
• January 2015 – 1.7%
• January 2016 – 0.0%
• January 2017 – 0.3%
• January 2018 – 2.0%

For the 66 million recipients' S.S. payments (which the government calls an "entitlement" but is actually a repayment of money we contributed) next year, the joke is on us.  There is no increase.  The government is taking the 2% back as an overpayment to everyone for an increase of Plan B of Medicare for 2017.  The monthly payments will remain the same in 2018 as they were for 2017.

Every recipient received a letter recently from S.S. telling us of the 2% COLA increase starting in January 2018.  Without anyone but the politicians knowing it, the government raised the cost of Plan B of Medicare in 2016, for 2017, by more than 20%.

S.S. is not allowed to lower the amount of a monthly check, so instead of deducting the increase in the 2017 checks, which would have alerted us to their trickery, they are taking the money away in 2018.

The Maserati will just have to wait.

Susan Daniels is an Ohio private investigator who has been interested in Social Security since she uncovered Obama's continued use of a stolen number.  That stolen number even appeared on his 2009 IRS filing from the White House.