Money Talk: No Cost-of-Living Increase For Social Security Recipients In 2016
by October 19, 2015 5:22 am 150 views
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NO COST-OF-LIVING INCREASE FOR SOCIAL SECURITY RECIPIENTS IN 2016: With consumer prices down over the past year, the Social Security Administration announced this past week that monthly benefits for nearly 65 million Americans will not automatically increase in 2016. The Social Security Act provides for an automatic increase in Social Security and SSI benefits if there is an increase in inflation as measured by the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers.
The Department of Health and Human Services has not yet announced Medicare premium changes for 2016. Should there be an increase in the Medicare Part B premium, the law contains a “hold harmless” provision that protects approximately 70% of Social Security beneficiaries from paying a higher Part B premium, in order to avoid reducing their net Social Security benefit. Those not protected include higher income beneficiaries subject to an income-adjusted Part B premium and beneficiaries newly entitled to Part B in 2016, which has to be paid by the state where the Medicare recipient resides.
For information about the Social Security and Medicare changes for 2016, click here.
ATM, OVERDRAFT FEES SET NEW RECORDS: The average fee for using an out-of-network ATM rose 4% over the past year to a record $4.52 per transaction, according to Bankrate.com’s 18th-annual checking survey. The fee has risen 21% over the past five years. Atlanta is the priciest city to make an out-of-network transaction ($5.15) and San Francisco is the cheapest ($3.85).
The average overdraft fee also set a new record ($33.07) and is up 9% since 2010. Milwaukee has the nation’s highest average overdraft fee ($34.79) and San Francisco again has the lowest ($30.35). Bankrate surveyed 10 banks and thrifts in each of 25 large U.S. markets from July 9 to Aug. 5, 2015. Read more here.
HOME BANCSHARES ANNOUNCES NEW HEAD OF CORPORATE EFFICIENCIES: Home BancShares Inc. recently announced the promotion of Conway native Donna Townsell to senior executive vice president of Corporate Efficiencies. She will serve in that role for the parent company and Centennial Bank, the regional financial group’s Conway-based operating subsidiary. Townsell serves on several committees for the Arkansas regional bank, including operations and strategic planning. Prior to her new role, Townsell served as project manager for Centennial and led the bank’s Build-A-Better-Bank campaign.
INVESTMENT BROKERS WARY OF U.S. GROWTH, GLOBAL MARKET SLOWDOWN: Investment managers are less optimistic on the prospects for U.S. economic growth in the near term and more concerned about the potential impact of an emerging markets slowdown on stock prices, according to a quarterly survey by Northern Trust Asset Management.
The survey of approximately 100 money managers, taken in mid-September, found a sharp drop-off in expectations for U.S. growth: only 29% expect growth to accelerate over the next six months, down from the 54% who expected accelerating growth in the previous quarter’s survey and the smallest portion in the past three years with that view.
With global market volatility in August and early September as a backdrop, investment managers ranked a slowdown in emerging markets as the top risk to equity markets. In the previous quarter, emerging markets had been ranked last of eight possible risks to equities. A change in U.S. monetary policy, which was ranked as the top risk to equities in the previous two quarters, fell to fourth place in the third-quarter survey. The full survey and video highlights can be found here.
U.S. RENTAL RATES JUMP 5.4% VERSUS A YEAR AGO: Rental rates across the country continue to rise sharply year-over-year, with Texas and the Pacific region seeing the highest increases, according to third quarter statistics released by Real Property Management. During the third quarter of 2015, the average rental rates in the United States increased from $1,329 to $1,363, representing a 5.7% increase over the 2014 rate of $1,289 and a 2.5% increase since the second quarter. The data used rents on three-bedroom, single-family homes to insure comparability across markets.