But my not working as many hours or with as high a salary over my lifetime helped contribute to my spouse being a high earner.
The wealthy may pay the maximum tax but many of them do not pay the tax on 100% of their income. I’m sure you will collect far more than you ever paid in.
Pity the poor clergy who live in personages. They pay 15.23% self employment tax on 130% of their income. Talk about unfair!
And DH would rather they increase the amount of income subject to SS tax than change benefits to retirees. Btw, DH is self-employed, so he’s been paying over 15% too.
How about my point that someone with only his earnings gets a spousal benefit for that, but a family where both people worked obviously don’t get it.
Its worth the most to two people of the same age where both earned at the maximum. The incremental value that it provides resides in being able to collect a spousal benefit for four years while allowing your own benefit to accrue further, til age 70. That accrual increment is larger for high earners.
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Um. @“Cardinal Fang” Not really. The maximum SS tax, which is what I was referring to, is calculated on an individual basis. So, I pay the max each year and then get a couple of months break; my wife does not. The F&S could have helped us, since I am a public employee who has never gotten any of those things called a year-end bonus or stock options or any of those other lovely benefits (and my entitlement to my pension is constantly under attack), but those are different issues I don’t really care about this that much from a personal point of view, since I only learned of it a year or so ago, and it was never part of my retirement planning. Not that I ever plan to retire anyway, but that’s a totally different story. I actually think they should eliminate the cap on the SS tax. Don’t get me wrong. I love the months at the end of the year when my take home gets a bump, but that’s not fair either, and I would not complain about paying the same amount each month.
How that is not fair? Didn’t you already pay your fair share for the year?
Or do you consider this cap as another loophole?
The most predictable outcome when a politician suddenly finds that he’s raised another 100 bucks today to pay for expenses in the next generation is to spend 110 tomorrow.
Ha Ha. People call “loopholes” corruption when corporations get them, but everyone wants one (or more) of their own.
My upset is the fact that I turn 66 in August. Yes, we had planned on using this strategy.
Basically, as I was a low earner, my GF who never worked outside of the home will bring home more (1/2 or her H’s)
than I will when filing for my full benefit. 1/2 of her H’s is larger than 1/2 of my H’s also.
@CCDD14 : Not sure if you were replying to me, but, assuming you were, my position is that it is not “fair” to exempt the top portion of high-income workers (and I guess I qualify as one, although it sure does not feel like it) from the SS assessment after they hit a certain level each year. It makes the SS assessment regressive, and I’m still liberal enough to dislike it.
Money paid into SS doesn’t go into a slush fund…the Social Security Administration is required by law to invest SS funds in US treasury bonds. The money from the sale of bonds goes into the Treasury and can be spent. For example, on invading a foreign country and waging war without raising taxes to pay for it.
If you’re that age, there’s a decent chance that one of you can still obtain part of the benefit of collecting a spousal while adding delayed credits. Read the Oblivious Investor blogs, and some others. Its a little tough to parse through the possibiliies, but if you’re that age there is probably still nearly the same benefit available.
Not sure the GF is relevant, but if the point is that the spousal benefit for non-working spouses is the free lunch, that point is a lot more supportable. Said differently, a worker with a non-working spouse gets a 50% boost in benefits. The file and suspend four years max 50% spousal benefit is a small sop to fairness.
You’re right. It was even worse than I thought. Bye, Felicia.
Oh man, I was looking forward to exploring the file and suspend…
We never could do file and suspend, so no change here. H isn’t going to get any SS–he doesn’t have many quarters and would have govt offset from his fed pension. I will probably wait until I’m 70 to draw SS.
Ok…we heard of a family where they had four children quite late in life…all will be about 12 when the father files and suspends. They planned to file and suspend…and both the kids AND the mom were going to collect. Is that right? Something about the kids being under 18.
This father makes about $200,000 a year. Just couldn’t believe they could do this.
Question…what is the youngest age at which a person can file and suspend?
Had to look it up. 
Losing is tough, but you will get better if you dust yourself off and persist.
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I should have done a better job looking it up, the first time. 