FRA has adjusted, why haven’t there been other age adjustments for Social Security benefits? Leaving them alone works in the system’s favor.
retirement benefits
The Restricted Application for Social Security Spousal Benefits
Note: with the passage of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 into law, File & Suspend and Restricted Application have been effectively eliminated for anyone born in 1954 or later. If born before 1954 there are some options still available, but these are limited as well. Please see the article The Death of File & Suspend and Restricted Application for more details. One provision of Social Security benefits that is relatively unknown is the restricted application for Spousal Benefits. This provision allows a person to apply for benefits based upon his or her spouse’s record while delaying receipt of benefits based upon his or her own record. The restricted application is only available when three factors have been met: 1 – the individual filing the restricted application has reached Full Retirement Age (FRA); and 2 – the individual has not filed for his or her own Retirement Benefit; and 3 […]
Example Using Spousal Benefits and Delayed Retirement Credits for Social Security
(Photo credit: jodigreen) Note: with the passage of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 into law, File & Suspend and Restricted Application have been effectively eliminated for anyone born in 1954 or later. If born before 1954 there are some options still available, but these are limited as well. Please see the article The Death of File & Suspend and Restricted Application for more details. This particular situation was presented to me by a reader. Since the facts represent a fairly common situation that we haven’t addressed here in the past, I thought I’d present it here for discussion. Here’s the original question (altered a bit for clarity): My wife and I are age 65 & 67 respectively. We’re both still working part-time, and my wife has now 20 years of earnings on her Social Security record. At this point her PIA is approximately 45% of my PIA, and increasing […]
Sterling Raskie, MSFS, CFP®, ChFC®
The latest in our Owner’s Manual series, A 401(k) Owner’s Manual, was published in January 2020 and is available on 
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And if you’ve come here to learn about queuing waterfowl, I apologize for the confusion. You may want to discuss your question with Lester, my loyal watchduck and self-proclaimed “advisor’s advisor”.