Author: Elizabeth Blessing
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Medicare Advantage plans can charge up to $9,850 in network next year, and $14,800 once care goes out of network
Medicare has just locked in the dollar ceiling a Medicare Advantage plan is allowed to charge enrollees in 2027, and the number is higher than what plans could charge this year. For anyone who ends up needing extensive hospital or specialist care, the figure that matters most is not the monthly premium. It is the…
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SNAP’s savings limit for households with someone 60 or older rises to $4,750 on October 1
A household does not lose Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program eligibility just because it has some money saved, but there is a ceiling, and it is about to move for the first time since last fall. Starting October 1, households with a member who is 60 or older, or who is disabled, will be allowed to…
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Supplemental Security Income now averages $737 a month across 7.4 million people
Supplemental Security Income gets described in most coverage as a flat monthly check, but the number that actually lands in a recipient’s bank account depends on a formula most people never see. The Social Security Administration’s newest accounting of the program, covering January 2026, breaks that formula down person by person rather than reporting a…
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The Villages Health will pay $541.5 million to settle claims it sent Medicare false diagnosis codes
The Villages Health System, the primary care network built to serve Florida’s sprawling retirement community, has agreed to pay $541.5 million to resolve allegations that it caused false diagnosis codes to be sent to Medicare Advantage insurers so it could collect bigger payments. The Department of Justice announced the deal on August 26, calling it…
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SNAP’s maximum benefit for a family of four rises to $1,023 on October 1
Every October, the U.S. Department of Agriculture recalculates how far a Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefit is supposed to stretch, based on the rising cost of a basic grocery basket. The federal fiscal year 2027 adjustment is now final, and it raises the maximum monthly amount a household can receive across the 48 contiguous states…
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The FTC is paying Amazon Flex drivers whose tips the company held back
The Federal Trade Commission is in the middle of another round of payments to Amazon Flex drivers whose tips the company secretly kept years ago. This time the money is arriving by Zelle rather than a paper check, aimed specifically at drivers who never cashed the check the agency mailed them the first time around.…
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Health systems are warning patients about a fake MyChart email promising a Medicare kit
Impersonating the MyChart patient portal, a wave of near-identical emails and text messages has been landing in patients’ inboxes promising a free “MyChart Medicare Kit” that doesn’t exist. The messages carry the MyChart logo and promise a free “MyChart Medicare Kit” or “Senior Health Package,” and dozens of hospitals and health systems around the country…
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Prosecutors say five men laundered $7.4 million taken from 77 older victims through 21 shell companies
Five men were indicted on charges that they laundered more than $7.4 million in fraud proceeds taken from at least 77 victims through 21 shell companies and 44 bank accounts routed to Hong Kong and China, federal prosecutors in Seattle allege. Federal prosecutors in Seattle say five men laundered more than $7.4 million in proceeds…
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Fifty-one strikers will split $3.66 million after a company refused to take them back, about $71,813 each
After a six-year-old labor dispute in a small Pennsylvania town, the National Labor Relations Board has just announced one of the larger strike settlements it has issued this year. Langeloth Metallurgical Company will pay $3,662,485 to 51 former strikers after the Board’s Region 6 found the company illegally slow-walked or refused to bring workers back…
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Only 38.6 percent of displaced workers 65 and older found new work, and nearly half stopped looking
The newest federal snapshot of layoffs makes one thing plain: age is one of the biggest predictors of whether someone gets back to work after losing a job. The Bureau of Labor Statistics found that among long-tenured workers pushed out of a job between 2023 and 2025, only 38.6 percent of those 65 and older…
