Tens of millions of Social Security recipients could see larger monthly checks and a higher floor on the program’s minimum benefit if Congress passes the Social Security 2100 Act, a bill reintroduced this session on both sides of Capitol Hill. The measure, filed in the House as H.R. 9519 by Rep. John B. Larson and listed among the current House legislation, is being advanced in the Senate by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who has highlighted Social Security expansion in his recent press statements. The proposal would replace the formula used to calculate annual cost-of-living adjustments and set the minimum benefit at 125% of the federal poverty level. None of those changes take effect unless lawmakers vote the bill into law, and the 2026 Trustees Report projects the system’s finances across a 75-year window that stretches to 2100, adding pressure to act before trust-fund reserves shrink further.
How the CPI-E formula would change every retiree’s COLA
The bill’s most consequential provision swaps the price index that determines annual benefit increases. Social Security currently ties its cost-of-living adjustment to the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers, known as CPI-W. The Social Security 2100 Act would instead use the R-CPI-E index, a research series the Bureau of Labor Statistics produces at Congress’s direction. Because older Americans spend proportionally more on health care and housing, the R-CPI-E has historically tracked higher than CPI-W, meaning COLAs calculated under the new formula would be slightly larger each year.
That difference compounds over time. A retiree who claims benefits at 62 and lives past 75 would accumulate years of marginally higher adjustments, widening the gap between what current law delivers and what the CPI-E formula would pay. A Congressional Research Service brief confirms that an R-CPI-E-based COLA differs from the existing indexing method, though the exact dollar spread depends on future inflation patterns. The compounding effect matters most for the oldest beneficiaries, who face the steepest medical costs and have the least ability to supplement their income with wages.
Supporters argue that tying COLAs to a retiree-focused index better reflects the real-world inflation seniors experience. Medical premiums, prescription drugs, long-term care, and rent often rise faster than the broader consumer basket. Under the current CPI-W formula, Social Security checks can gradually lose purchasing power in precisely those categories that dominate older households’ budgets. By design, a CPI-E-based adjustment would aim to keep pace more closely with those specific costs, even if the annual percentage difference looks modest in any single year.
Critics, however, warn that any upward shift in COLA calculations carries a long-run price tag. Because higher benefits are paid not just to new retirees but to all current beneficiaries, even a small annual increase compounds into significantly higher obligations over decades. That raises questions about how to balance more generous indexing with the program’s already strained finances, especially as the baby boomer cohort continues to retire and live longer than previous generations.
Minimum benefit, actuarial scoring, and the poverty question
Beyond the COLA change, the bill targets the program’s lowest earners. Proposals like the Social Security 2100 Act include a minimum benefit set at 125% of the poverty line, according to a Brookings Institution analysis. The goal is to ensure that a lifetime of covered work yields a benefit that lifts an individual above official poverty thresholds, addressing criticism that some long-term low-wage workers still retire into poverty despite paying payroll taxes for decades.
That same research raises a practical concern: an enhanced Social Security minimum benefit interacts unevenly with Supplemental Security Income, the separate means-tested program for low-income aged and disabled individuals. Some recipients who qualify for both programs could see their SSI reduced dollar-for-dollar as their Social Security check rises, blunting the anti-poverty effect the bill’s sponsors intend. In those cases, a higher Social Security payment might simply replace federal SSI dollars rather than leaving the beneficiary significantly better off in net terms.
Designing the minimum benefit also has implications for program solvency. Raising benefits at the bottom of the earnings distribution increases total outlays, and the Social Security Administration’s actuarial estimates for solvency proposals typically weigh such expansions against potential revenue changes. Versions of the Social Security 2100 framework have paired richer benefits with higher payroll tax rates or a broader taxable wage base to keep the trust funds solvent over the long run. How the current bill ultimately balances those levers will determine whether it modestly shortens, maintains, or extends the projected life of the trust funds.
For retirees and workers, the stakes are concrete. A more generous COLA formula could mean hundreds of dollars more per year after a decade on the rolls, especially for those in their 80s and 90s. A higher minimum benefit could reduce the share of very old Americans living below the poverty line, particularly among workers with intermittent or low-wage careers. Yet the interaction with SSI and the broader question of how to finance expanded benefits ensure that debates over the Social Security 2100 Act will focus not only on what beneficiaries gain, but also on how the system pays for those promises over the 75-year horizon that policymakers use to judge solvency.
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