No Social Security COLA for 2016?

My former SSA collague Jason Ficthner of the Mercatus Center, writes for Marketwatch on the prospect that Social Security won't pay a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) in 2016. 

Lost in the news surrounding the release of the 2015 Social Security Trustees report is the likelihood that Social Security beneficiaries won't see a cost-of-living adjustment increase, or COLA, in 2016. According to the Trustees, Social Security beneficiaries can expect to receive a COLA increase of 0.0 percent. That's right ... a goose egg.

Why? Well, not much inflation. Check out Jason's piece for more details.

Side note: here's a New York Times piece on the COLA I wrote with Alicia Munnell back in 2010, when beneficiaries also faced the prospect of a zero COLA. Of all the  things I've written -- including some that in retrospect were incendiary and probably ill-considered -- none produced as strong and negative response as this piece. Some of the emails I received were scary.