Retirement Social Security

How Trump's Current Agenda Could Impact Social Security's 2027 COLA

Current tariff policies could have a big effect on next year's raise.

By Maurie Backman

Edited by Laura Hohenstein

Updated March 23, 2026

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Social Security is an important retirement income stream for many older Americans today. And the program's annual cost-of-living adjustments, or COLAs, play a crucial role in helping seniors stretch their income further.

Social Security COLAs are calculated based on third-quarter changes to the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W). For this reason, an official 2027 COLA won't be announced until October of this year. But the Trump administration's policies could have an impact on next year's COLA.

Let's review how tariffs and the Middle East conflict could influence Social Security's 2027 COLA.

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How Trump's policies could impact the 2027 COLA

Even though the Social Security Administration typically makes a COLA announcement in October, there are clues along the way on what to expect. And based on current economic data, here are some early-in-the-year estimates for 2027's COLA:

The Senior Citizens League projects a 2.8% increase.
Independent Social Security analyst Mary Johnson projects a 1.2% raise.
The Congressional Budget Office projects a 3.1% boost.

But these numbers aren't close to being set in stone. And some of President Trump's policies could lead to a larger Social Security in 2026.

Let's start with tariffs, which are already having an impact on U.S. consumers. The Tax Foundation says tariffs caused an average tax increase of $1,000 per household in 2025 and are likely to increase per-household taxes by $600 this year. And earlier this year, Morningstar reported that tariffs are expected to cause a rise in inflation in 2026.

As it is, Trump's tariffs led to higher costs in 2025, which contributed to this year's 2.8% Social Security COLA. If that continues, inflation could climb in 2026, leading to a larger COLA in 2027.

Oil prices from the Middle East conflict could also have a big impact. On March 16, oil and gas prices reached their highest level since October of 2023.

Oil and gas prices are included in the CPI-W. And if they continue to increase, it could set the stage for a more robust 2027 COLA.

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Seniors shouldn't get too excited about a larger COLA in 2027

A more generous Social Security COLA in 2027 might seem like a good thing at first. But it's important to understand the flaw in that logic.

Social Security COLAs are tied directly to inflation, so a larger raise means that prices are rising at a faster pace. In other words, what Social Security recipients gain in the form of larger monthly benefits, they lose in the form of having to pay more for essential expenses.

More so than that, Social Security COLAs have a long history of lagging behind inflation, despite the fact that they're designed to keep up with it. Part of the problem is that healthcare costs have generally been rising at a faster pace than inflation broadly, coupled with the fact that Social Security beneficiaries tend to spend a larger share of their income on healthcare than the general population.

In 2026, for example, the cost of Medicare Part B rose to $202.90 from $185. That's a roughly 9.7% increase compared to 2025, and it's more than three times the 2.8% COLA Social Security recipients got at the start of the year.

Furthermore, the Kaiser Family Foundation reports that prices for hospital services and related care rose 7.7% between March of 2023 and March of 2024. During that same time period, broad inflation increased by 3.5%. If that trend continues, seniors on Social Security are apt to get even less mileage out of their COLAs, even during periods when they're more generous.

Plus, medical care is not heavily weighted in the Consumer Price Index. The Bureau of Labor Statistics says that as of December of 2025, it only comprised about 8.4% of CPI expenses in total. For this reason, advocates have long argued that the CPI-W is a poor measure for calculating COLAs, as it does not do a good job of capturing the costs seniors on Social Security commonly face.

Bottom line

It's common for seniors on Social Security to wish for a large COLA. And there's plenty of time for the estimates above to shift higher or lower as the year progresses.

But even if estimates for 2027's COLA increase in the coming months, that's not necessarily a good thing for retirees. Any increase in COLA projections is only going to be offset by higher costs. So all told, there's no net gain for Social Security recipients.

The best way for seniors on Social Security to gain buying power is to build savings and invest their money so it's able to outpace inflation. Retirees should not count on their COLAs to do the same.

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