Social Security & Medicare
Benefit changes, claiming strategies, eligibility rules, Medicare enrollment, Part D updates, and policy changes affecting retirees.
Latest in Social Security & Medicare
Regence Medicare Advantage members lose in-network access to OHSU and Hillsboro Medical Center on January 1
Oregon Health & Science University and Hillsboro Medical Center will stop being in-network hospitals for anyone enrolled in a Regence BlueCross BlueShield Medicare Advantage HMO...
The federal SSI check now averages $712.88 a month, and where states add a supplement it averages $211.91
Two different SSI numbers moved in the same August data release: $712.88, the average federal Supplemental Security Income payment for the program’s 7,306,182 recipients, and...
Nearly 7 million disabled workers on Social Security now average $1,635.90 a month
A monthly average of $1,635.90 is what Social Security paid each of its 6,975,000 disabled-worker beneficiaries in August, according to the agency’s own snapshot, putting...
MMM Healthcare spent below Medicare’s 85% medical-loss-ratio floor three years running, triggering a 2027 enrollment ban
Three consecutive years is the specific threshold that turned a spending shortfall into an enrollment ban. Federal rules require a Medicare Advantage insurer to spend...
Medicare bars current MMM Healthcare Advantage members from switching within their contract in 2027
A Medicare Advantage contract can be frozen to new members while its current members are still inside it, and that is exactly the position roughly...
Social Security staff never started or finished reviews of 63 earnings alerts on sampled SSI recipients, an audit found
Social Security’s own system caught the problem; its staff simply did not act on what it found. A federal audit of Supplemental Security Income recipients...
Medicare couples with income up to $2,184 a month can get help paying Part B premiums through SLMB in 2026
The Specified Low-Income Medicare Beneficiary program pays a Medicare couple’s Part B premium in 2026 when household income runs up to $2,184 a month and...
Social Security staff did not determine the value of vehicles owned by 24 sampled SSI recipients, an audit found
A separate finding buried in the same Social Security Administration inspector general memo cuts the other way from the agency’s usual overpayment story: it is...
People who joined Medicare Advantage when first eligible can leave within a year and buy Medigap without health questions
A retiree who chooses a Medicare Advantage plan the moment they become eligible for Medicare, and later decides within that first year to leave it,...
Medicare Advantage and drug plans send January changes in a September notice
Every fall, Medicare Advantage and Medicare drug plans mail a document called the Annual Notice of Change, and this September’s mailing lists whatever coverage and...
Social Security’s 800 number answered calls in an average of 0.6 minutes in July, agency data shows
Social Security’s national 800 number answered calls in an average of 0.6 minutes in July, down from 8 minutes in July 2025, according to the...
Psoriasis drug Otezla’s Medicare price drops 65 percent, to $1,650 a month, in January
Plaque psoriasis, psoriatic arthritis and the oral ulcers of Behçet’s disease are the three conditions Otezla treats, and starting in January, Medicare’s negotiated price for...
Medicare’s price for the movement-disorder drug Austedo falls from $6,623 to $4,093 a month on January 1
Austedo, a drug that controls involuntary movements caused by Huntington’s disease and by antipsychotic-induced tardive dyskinesia, will cost Medicare $4,093 instead of $6,623 for a...
About 885,000 initial disability claims were pending at Social Security in July, down from more than 935,000
Social Security had about 885,000 initial disability claims awaiting a first decision in July, down from more than 935,000 a year earlier, according to the...
Seniors on SSI average $611.26 a month, the lowest of any age group
Supplemental Security Income pays its smallest average monthly check to the age group most people associate with the program’s core purpose: recipients 65 and older...
A married couple can qualify for Medicare’s Extra Help with income up to $32,460 and resources up to $36,100 in 2026
Medicare’s Extra Help program sets its 2026 limits for a married couple at $32,460 in income and $36,100 in resources, and a couple under both...
Social Security disability rolls fell by 106,000 in a year, to 6.98 million
Social Security paid disability benefits to 6,975,000 workers in August 2026, down 106,000 from the 7,081,000 counted a year earlier, according to the agency’s own...
Social Security widows and widowers now average $1,934.37 a month
Roughly 3.5 million nondisabled widows and widowers drawing Social Security survivor benefits averaged $1,934.37 a month in August 2026, according to the Social Security Administration’s...
UnitedHealthcare seeks AARP Medigap increases of up to 13.5% for about 350,000 New York members in 2027
UnitedHealthcare has asked New York’s Department of Financial Services to approve rate increases of up to 13.5 percent on AARP-branded Medicare Supplement policies, a request...
First-time Social Security disability claims took 186 days on average in July, down from 220 a year earlier
Social Security took an average of 186 days to issue a first decision on a disability claim in July, down from 220 days a year...