OpenTheBooks CEO John Hart joins Varney & Co. to discuss long-term deficits in Social Security and Medicare as fiscal pressure mounts.
Some Social Security beneficiaries will receive two checks this July as a quirk in the calendar has changed the payment timeline for the next month.
The Social Security Administration (SSA) usually issues Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments on the first day of a given month. The SSI program provides monthly payments to certain older adults with little or no income, as well as to people with disabilities, which is different from regular Social Security retirement benefits.
If the first day of the month falls on a weekend or public holiday, SSI payments for that month are made on the last business day of the previous month to ensure that beneficiaries receive their funds before the start of the new month, and cover potential costs.
Because of the way the 2026 calendar falls, two SSI payments will come out in July – one came out last week on July 1, and the other came out on Friday, July 31, in the month of August because Aug. 1 is Saturday.
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Some Social Security beneficiaries will receive two months’ worth of benefit checks in July due to a calendar quirk. (Getty Images/stock)
The 2026 calendar will cause this variable to play twice more this year in SSI payments.
Both October and December will see SSI payments coming out to beneficiaries because November 1 will be a weekend and January 1 will be a federal holiday on a Friday.
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The SSA adjusts the payment dates for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits based on the calendar and the beginning of the month. (Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
SSI payments are usually made by direct deposit, although beneficiaries who do not have bank accounts or want to receive funds in a different way may be able to receive them through Direct Express cards.
The SSA decided to stop checking paperwork at the end of the federal government’s last fiscal year in September following an order by the Trump administration as early as 2025 that mandated that all federal payments switch to electronic transfers, such as direct deposits to bank accounts or transfers to debit cards.
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Most Social Security benefits are paid by direct deposit. (Mark Felix / The Washington Post)
Data from the SSA showed that as of last September, more than 68 million Americans received Social Security benefits and of that number, about 390,000 or 0.6% received paper checks.
The SSA website provides ways for beneficiaries to register to make a deposit directly through the My Social Security platform, or by phone through SSA or the Department of the Treasury’s electronic payment solution center.
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