“The bottom line: waiting for age 70 may yield more in pretax “paper” income, but far less in real after-tax income.”
I respectfully disagree. Take out SS as soon as you can and invest it. A) I’d rather be in charge of more of my money than broke govt be in charge of it. B) When you die your SS check ends, but your investments are still around for your heirs.
So SS fund is going bankrupt, but...
“In general, one should avoid beginning benefits prior to Full Retirement Age (FRA), which is age 66...”
Pffft.
Is there any way to get SS before age 62?
“””About that Social Security trust fund running out...””
No mention of the welfare fund ever running out of money.
To be clear...I didn’t “pay in”. It’s been taken from me without any choice.
I started mine at 62 for two reasons.
I got the money when I was most able to enjoy those things that I will not be able to enjoy at 90. Travel, hiking, camping, competitive swimming, etc.
The second reason is when SS reform comes around the Gov. will issue the following statement: “Do not worry. If you are already receiving benefits, SS will not change for you.” Any change will not be for the better, for those not in the program.
The “trust fund” never was real.
Certainly not since Slick Willie’s days as POTUS.
LOL.
The National Debt just soared by $4 trillion this year.
NOBODY is going to cut Social Security. It is political death. NOBODY. They will just print and print until the coming financial collapse, and then hit RESET, after all of the suffering the financial collapse causes.
Buy gold.
There will be a huge voting block of people on SS.
Any attempt to reduce what is due will be met by throw the bums out
mentality.
Oh Wow! Another idiot to tell us about the Ponzi scheme. I’m confused. When does “know your enemy” turn into constant assault from the bolsheviks?
While benefits can begin as early as age 62, the cost of doing so is a permanent 25% lifetime reduction of benefits....
True but then you have to weigh the benefits. I started taking SS at 63. It would take me 9+ years to make up that difference in $$ I received from SS if I retired at 66. So I’d be 75 before I started seeing that benefit.
Mine’s in a lock box. No worries!
If Trump isn’t re-elected the new Commies taking over may declare SS was part of the Confederacy. And we have all witnessed what they do then.
Defund illegal care problem solved.
Imagine you have a new child. You realize in 18 years you will have to pay for college for her so you get a big cookie jar to save in. You start off dropping a $20 bill in every week. But after a few weeks you want to go out to eat and have a few drinks so you raid the cookie jar for cash and leave an IOU to yourself. You then get into the habit of doing that. Eventually you don't even bother to put in the money. Instead you just put in the IOU directly every week and spend the cash.
Fast forward 18 years and now you have a cookie jar full of IOUs to yourself to pay for college. After being laughed out of the first couple bursars offices trying to convince them that the IOUs are just as good as money you realize that you need to come up with a solution. You can cut you other spending and pay for college with your current income. You can borrow real money from the bank to "pay off" those IOUs because you have no other money. Or you could convince your daughter to go to community college or even just get a job instead.
These three are analogous to what can be done with Social Security. We could cut other spending to afford to pay for it. We could borrow money from the real bond market to pay for Social Security. We could just cut or eliminate Social Security. We could also print new money which wasn't an option for the college cookie jar.
Now here's the real secret. If we never had a "lockbox" we would be in exactly the same position right down to the dollar: cut other spending, borrow or cut Social Security. The lockbox (or cookie jar full of IOUs) meant nothing. It was an accounting lie from its inception.
“Putting aside inflation adjustments and time value of money considerations ...”
Why would you want to do either, but especially the latter? The break-even time is typically 11-13 years from when you start collecting.
What a great idea.
I should delay taking social security until I’m 70, 14 years from now, when social security will be out of money, 14 years from now.
I opted to take mySocial Security at age 62. My rationale was that it will be far harder for the government to deny benefits to those already receiving them, than to deny, cut or otherwise alter benefits for those first applying at say age 70. If you are currently in your 50s you are likely to see greatly reduced benefits and if you are younger you won’t get a dime.