Social pensions this year were indexed to inflation by 1.3%, which averages about $ 20 per month. As for the consumer basket of pensioners, its value, according to the Ministry of Trade, has grown much steeper.
From March 2020 to March of this year, car rental prices increased by 31.2%, laundry equipment by 24.2%, gasoline by 22.2%, and diesel fuel used in home heating – by 20.2%.
Prescription drug prices have remained unchanged, but a visit to a therapist now has to pay an average of 5.3% more than a year ago. All this painfully hits those who live on a fixed pension, its purchasing power is declining.
The general inflation rate in the first quarter of this year reached 1.4%, a record value in the last 9 years; In the first quarter of 2020, inflation was 0% due to a sharp slowdown in economic activity amid the pandemic.
If the trend continues, the Pension Fund will probably announce an increase in indexation for the next one in October, 2022. The last time pensions rose significantly in 2009, the increase then amounted to 5.8%. Over the past decade, the average growth has hovered around 1.4%.
Surveys of American retirees show that 62% of them support the idea of a guaranteed minimum annual increase in pension. The pensioner lobby is also in favor of recalculating pensions in accordance not with the standard consumer price index, but with a special one that reflects the composition of the consumer basket of the elderly population.
Newspaper headline:
Expenses grow faster than pensions