What Exactly Is a “Trump Bump” COLA?

Social Security’s COLA exists to protect beneficiaries from inflation. It’s calculated using the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W), based on the average reading from July, August, and September of the current year compared to the same period the year before. If prices for the goods and services seniors typically buy rise by a given percentage, benefits are supposed to rise by roughly the same amount the following January.

In 2026, that formula produced a 2.8% COLA. According to retirement-focused financial analysts, part of that increase traced back to President Trump’s April 2025 tariff and trade policy, which imposed a sweeping global tariff along with higher reciprocal tariffs on dozens of countries. Even though most of those specific tariffs were later struck down by a February 2026 Supreme Court ruling, the inflationary pressure they added to consumer prices in the meantime still fed into the 2026 COLA calculation.

Now, heading into 2027, a similar dynamic is playing out — but with an added, more serious ingredient.