10 Retiree Costs That Have Risen Most Since 2000

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In a study released Wednesday, The Senior Citizens League, an advocacy group that supports increasing Social Security benefits, explores the impact of rising costs on retirees and how well Social Security’s cost-of-living adjustments have kept up.

Based on inflation forecasts and the Consumer Price Index data for April, released Wednesday, the group estimates that the 2024 Social Security COLA will be 3.1%.

As the group notes, Social Security COLAs increased benefits by 78% between January 2000 and February 2023, averaging 3.4% annually.

During the same period, however, the cost of goods and services bought by typical retirees shot up by 141.4%, averaging some 6.2% per year. Consider groceries: For every $100 a retired household spent on food in 2000, it can buy only about $64 worth today.

See the gallery for the 10 costs The Senior Citizens League’s research found have risen fastest since 2000. When average prices were unavailable, researchers used numeric values from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers.

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