Are your benefits as strong as they can be? Like personal health, financial health can always be improved. Seniors today rely heavily on their Social Security to supplement their monthly income. Social Security is considered to only replace 40% of a senior’s income; however, approximately 40% of seniors depend on their Social Security to replace half of their entire retirement savings. So, are seniors getting the best out of their Social Security? Or are seniors only getting average benefits at best?
The Motley Fool is an organization and publication dedicated to offering financial advisement and investing guidance. It’s forecasted that seniors in 2022 will receive $1,657 a month in Social Security. That number depends on varied factors, but it’s the general number to beat.
The Motley Fool’s Katie Brockman reports on three key tips to heighten your benefits and to check to see if you’re on track to beat the average. She outlines three simple criteria to receive above average benefits: work longer than 35 years; do what you can to earn an above average salary; delay claiming benefits.
Working longer than 35 years increases your primary insurance amount (pia) which what the Social Security Administration uses to calculate your benefits. They take the average of your wages from 35 of your highest paying working years, and if you work less than that amount you can lessen your future payments.
Earning more in that time will also increase payout. $147,000 is the 2022 Social Security tax limit. Increasing your salary to this limit as much as you can, will benefit your PIA in the future. Finally, delay your claiming your benefits till your full retirement age.
Waiting might not be best for everyone, but claiming benefits before your full retirement age, or before the age 70, can deduct almost 30% from your total. Waiting till age 70 does the opposite, allowing you to get your full benefit with potentially 32% more added on. Check your retirement plan and verify if this strategy can work for you.
One way to help increase your benefits is to ensure that the government doesn’t touch them. By helping The Council for Retirement Security support the Social Security Lockbox Act, we can make sure our benefits stay in the Trust before they get to us.
The Social Security Lockbox Petition is our way of raising our concerns about how we want our Social Security to be handled. By keeping the government from spending our benefits on irrelevant programs, we can make sure our benefits stay in our own hands. That way we can focus on important things like making sure those benefits are as big as they can be.
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