Social Security Administration says cost-of-living adjustment will rise 3.6% in 2027
(Getty Images stock photo/Douglas Sacha)
Social Security benefits will increase 3.6% beginning in January for more than 70 million recipients, the Social Security Administration (SSA) said on Wednesday.
The cost-of-living adjustment for 2027, known as COLA, came in markedly higher than the prior year’s hike of 2.8%.
The annual uptick in Social Security benefits aims to keep payments on pace with inflation, which surged in the spring after the outbreak of the Iran war.
The rise in Social Security payments for 2027 amounts to an average increase of about $75 a month for each recipient, the SSA said.
The announcement on Wednesday came after inflation data for September showed price hikes had climbed to a four-month high due in large part to a surge in gasoline costs. The fresh reading marked the final piece of data necessary for SSA to calculate COLA for 2027.
“Social Security will implement this cost-of-living adjustment for 76 million Americans, giving them greater financial stability,” Commissioner Frank Bisignano said in a statement.
The agency will also hike the maximum amount of earnings subject to the Social Security tax, elevating the taxable income limit from $184,500 to $192,300.
Recipients can check their online accounts with Social Security for notifications of their new benefit amount beginning in late November, the agency said. Notices will be sent to recipients by mail starting in early December.
CEO of OpenAI Sam Altman speaks during a United Nations Security Council meeting on artificial intelligence and international security on Sept. 23, 2026, in New York City. (Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — A nonprofit artificial intelligence safety group has sued OpenAI over a July incident in which the company’s autonomous AI agents accessed the computer systems of another firm, Hugging Face, without authorization during a cybersecurity test.
Legal Advocates for Safe Science & Technology (LASST) filed the lawsuit late Tuesday in San Francisco Superior Court, alleging roughly 700 of the company’s AI agents participated in the breach.
The AI agents stole credentials, uploaded malicious files and gained access to parts of Hugging Face’s production infrastructure, the lawsuit claims.
A spokesperson for OpenAI said the lawsuit was “without merit” in a statement to ABC News.
“Hugging Face was a serious incident and we’ve taken a series of actions in response to it, but this lawsuit is completely without merit,” said Drew Pusateri, a spokesperson for OpenAI.
The lawsuit seeks a court order barring OpenAI’s AI agents from accessing third-party computer systems without permission and requiring changes to what LASST calls unsafe AI development practices.
LASST “suffered harm” as a result of the hack into Hugging Face, the lawsuit says. In the aftermath of the incident, the group was “required to divert resources from its normal activities to educate regulators, civil society, and the public about the facts, legal issues, and potential dangers,” according to the lawsuit.
The self-directed hack into Hugging Face took place as OpenAI tested the capabilities of a pair of its AI models, the company said in July, describing how the technology had escaped and gained access to the open Internet.
A swarm of about 700 AI agents, in turn, hacked into AI firm Hugging Face and attempted to cover their tracks as they sought to complete the test, according to reports issued by research organizations METR and Redwood Research.
“We care very deeply about AI safety,” OpenAI CEO Sam Altman wrote on X in August. “We believe the entire field will have to coordinate on shared safety standards, but will act unilaterally in the meantime.”
“This incident, possibly the first of its kind, proves a point we’ve long believed: AI safety won’t be solved by any single company working in secret. It will be solved in the open, collaboratively, with broad access to AI for every defender, everywhere,” Clem Delangue, the co-founder and CEO of Hugging Face, said in a statement in July.
Hugging Face did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment about the lawsuit filed against OpenAI.
Altman dialed back the pace of his company’s AI development earlier this month. “The world deserves confidence that American companies developing increasingly capable AI will act responsibly, especially as the trajectory of progress has steepened,” Altman said in a post on X at the time.
OpenAI signaled further restraint toward its AI models this week, pausing the release of its latest AI model, GPT-6.1 Astra, due to security concerns.
Ranking member Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) delivers an opening statement during the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs confirmation hearing for Kevin Warsh, U.S. President Donald Trump’s nominee for Chair of the Federal Reserve, in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on April 21, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The Social Security fund will run out of money in as little as six years, a shorter time frame than previously estimated, according to a report released earlier this month by the programs’ trustees.
News of the funding cliff prompted a pair of lawmakers to reach across the aisle and propose a rescue plan in an opinion piece last week for the New York Times.
Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., called for lifting a cap on the amount of annual income subject to the payroll tax that funds Social Security. Currently, the cap stands at $184,500.
In other words, the plan would require individuals making more than $184,500 per year to pay taxes on the entirety of their income, potentially generating trillions in additional funds for the program over the next 10 years.
The proposal could, in theory, help administrators avoid painful solutions for recipients, such as a reduction of Social Security payments.
Legislation reflecting the proposal has not been introduced. In the New York Times, Moreno and Warren said they are “working on legislation.” Spokespeople for Moreno and Warren declined to comment on the status of the measure.
Here’s what to know about a new bipartisan proposal for safeguarding Social Security:
Is Social Security in financial trouble?
Yes, the program faces an ever-tightening budget squeeze over the next handful of years, according to a report this month from the Social Security fund’s trustees.
The Social Security trust fund will run dry in 2032, unless Congress combines the program’s old-age and disability funds, in which case insolvency would arrive in 2034, the report found. A finding last year from the program’s trustees predicted Social Security would become insolvent in 2033 or 2034.
The program generates revenue through a payroll tax paid by employees and employers, setting the income apart from the overall federal budget. Since the early 2010s, however, Social Security has paid more in benefits than it takes in through taxes, shrinking the program’s available funds, according to a study issued by the Urban Institute earlier this year.
The budget shortfall has been exacerbated by a decline in births and a reduction of immigration, resulting in fewer taxpayers at the same time that many Baby Boomers have begun receiving benefits. The One Big Beautiful Bill also removed a tax on Social Security benefits, depleting another source of the program’s revenue.
What is the Social Security reform proposal from Warren and Moreno?
The bipartisan reform proposal would tweak the payroll tax that funds Social Security.
The program is funded by a 12.4% payroll tax, which is evenly split between employers and workers. The tax, however, applies only to a maximum of $184,500 in annual income, meaning any income beyond that amount remains tax free.
The proposal put forward by Warren and Moreno would lift the cap on taxable income, allowing the tax to apply to the entirety of a person’s income even if they make more than $184,500 per year.
“Since the vast majority of Americans make less than that, most people are paying Social Security taxes on 100 percent of their earnings while the highest earners are paying on only part of theirs,” Warren and Moreno said in a co-authored opinion piece in the New York Times.
The elimination of the cap on taxable income would generate about $3.4 trillion in added revenue over the next decade, according to an analysis from the non-partisan Peterson Institute. The policy change would close more than half of the program’s funding gap, the group said.
“With rising prices and artificial intelligence causing economic uncertainty for the future, Social Security must remain a stable foundation to help retirees afford life’s basic necessities,” Warren and Moreno said.
The proposal drew opposition from at least one conservative lawmaker. Sen. Jon Husted, R-Ohio, faulted the plan for what he described as a “giant tax increase.”
“We need to secure social security, we need to protect it, we need to make it stronger,” Husted told “The Guy Benson Show” last week. “But I’m not on board with the approach that they’ve outlined.”
What are some alternative reforms for funding Social Security?
As the program’s budget woes have deepened in recent years, elected officials and researchers have proposed a range of solutions. As with any financial shortfall, the fixes either increase revenue or slash expenses.
An alternate means of increasing tax revenue for the program involves ratcheting up the payroll tax by one percentage point from 12.4% to 13.4%, the Peterson Institute said. That move would generate $601 billion in additional revenue over 10 years, closing about a quarter of the program’s funding gap, the group added.
If Congress fails to address the projected budget shortfalls, automatic cuts will dial back Social Security benefits by about 25% in 2032, the Social Security fund’s trustees said earlier this month.
Earlier this month, a bipartisan bill introduced in the House proposed establishing an independent commission composed of 13 members appointed by leaders in Congress and the president. The commission would seek out fixes for the long-term sustainability of the program. The bill, which counts three cosponsors, has been appointed to two House committees for consideration.
As the years pass, the task of reforming Social Security becomes a greater and greater challenge, the Urban Institute said.
“Waiting only makes the changes larger and more difficult,” the group added.
