Social Security retirement benefits depend on many factors. These checks are completely independent and individual and United States citizens can increase the amount if they know how. So, if you have not yet applied for a retirement check, you should consider whether it is really worth it to apply for it now or to wait a bit until you reach a higher amount.
On the other hand, that same check may get an increase if you have filed for the benefit. This increase occurs once a year and changes based on the CPI-W at a particular time of the year. This process is called Cost of Living Adjustment and can prevent Americans from losing purchasing power. In this way, every American who has already accepted a benefit can get a little extra money each year.
But the question for many citizens is, if there is a COLA in January, why can’t we have that adjustment in our Social Security payments in February or the rest of the months? Truth be told, you may find this question interesting, but the truth is that we can only get the COLA once a year. If you already have a Social Security check, it already has the increase added to it in February because January was the first of the months in which the COLA was added.
So, will we get a new Social Security increase in February?
The government claims that Social Security increases are only made once a year. So, no, we won’t get a little extra money in our February check. But we will continue to get the increase that was applied in January. This means that the February 2024 check will still be larger than last year’s check.
Even taking into account that there are no new increases, the truth is that there are other ways to increase the money we get each month. There are two benefits we can claim if we have a very low check. If our retirement check is not very large, we can get both SNAP Food Stamps and Supplemental Security Income payments.
The first of these, SNAP Food Stamps, is designed to give all United States citizens access to fresh food. The other payment, Supplemental Security Income, is administered by the Social Security Administration and is only for a specific group of Americans. Both checks are compatible with each other, and they are also compatible with the Social Security check.
Tips for increasing your retirement check
If you have not yet applied for a Social Security retirement check, there is still time to increase your monthly benefit. There are three factors that can make your payment higher or lower. By controlling these three factors as much as possible, you can get a much larger check. Even if we don’t get the maximum payment of $4,873 per month, we could still get a good benefit.
The three factors to keep in mind are your years of service, your retirement age, and your salary when you were a worker. If we keep all of these in mind and maximize the numbers, the check will be much larger.
The ideal scenario to get a good check is to work 35 years, have a high salary and retire at age 70. If we can’t achieve those conditions, we should at least get as close to them as possible. Only then will we get a good Social Security check that does not require outside checks or other benefits, so we can live with peace of mind.