Get What's Yours
Get What's Yours, The Secrets to Maxing Out Your Social Security, by Laurence J. Kotlikoff, Philip Moeller, and Paul Solman, Simon & Schuster 2015, REVISED AND UPDATED 2016
New social security regulations started taking effect on April 29, 2016 - It's 2 am, do you know where your ss money is, or was, or went to?
Basic data on a complex system: with 52M Americans between the ages of 54 and 69, 10,000 baby boomers reach retirement age every day. And while we may think the biggest decision about social security is when to take it - at age 65 or 70 - the authors cover in detail the many other decisions about social security that they claim will help receipients avoid their worst nightmare, dying poor.
The social security system has 2728 core rules and thousands of codicils that govern the system; in the case of married couples alone, the formula for each spouse's benefit comprises 10 complex mathematical functions! Help!
Fortunately, in eighteen readable chapters, plus one glossary and an Appendix containing actual benefits applications broken down step by step into how to successfully apply, the authors give the readers choices. Even if readers choose not to pursue these alternatives to running with the social security system, the authors manage to condense much of their help into these three general rules:
1. Rule 1. Be patient: take social security's best deal by waiting to collect for as long as possible - taking much higher benefits over somewhat fewer years.
2. Rule 2. Get ALL of What's Yours: Take all the benefits available to you based on the work history of your current spouse, you ex-spour(s), your deceased spouse(s), and your deceased ex-spouse(s).
3. Rule 3. Get the timing right: Since you can't collect two benefits at once, collect one bnefit early while letterng the other benefit grow.