Basic Social Security question

[OddGuy]

I'm 53, and still reporting earned income. I can look at my SS estimates now for ages 62, 67 and 70.

These numbers always suggest they're predicated on continuing to make (insert last year's earnings) until retirement age.

If I were to FIRE before that time, would the SS I eventually receive be considerably LESS than the amounts currently estimated?

 

[Dtail]

You can use the site below whereby you can change the earnings estimates to be zero for X number of years before retirement.
The instructions are fairly straightforward.

https://www.ssa.gov/benefits/retirement/estimator.html

 

[Red Badger]

FWIW, I retired at 60. When I compared SS at 60 and 62 (w*rking 2 additional years), the difference was minuscule. YMMV!

 

[ShokWaveRider]

I would like to think that mine now is quite accurate as my investment in SS for the last 10 years has been $0.

 

[Dtail]

I would like to think that mine now is quite accurate as my investment in SS for the last 10 years has been $0.

Well depending which SS estimator site you are using, as some of them assume you are still earning W2 type income until retirement.

 

[The Cosmic Avenger]

Is anyone else having issues with the estimator? I keep getting this:

Forbidden
Unfortunately, you do not have access to this service. Please check your url for errors and try again.
If you need immediate assistance: please contact us

EDIT: Yes, I'm logged in, and I disabled Firefox privacy protections for the ssa.gov site, etc.

 

[sengsational]

Firefox has been getting 403's for me on several sites when Chrome doesn't. You can try 'safe mode' (hamburger > help > restart with add ons disabled)

 

[The Cosmic Avenger]

Firefox has been getting 403's for me on several sites when Chrome doesn't. You can try 'safe mode' (hamburger > help > restart with add ons disabled)

It happens on every browser and platform. I'm certain as I can be that it's a server side issue (which would include any account restrictions), not computer or browser related. I submitted a ticket, but considering the difficulties people have had actually signing up/starting benefits, I'm not holding out hope for a solution...or even a response.

 

[CardsFan]

Is anyone else having issues with the estimator? I keep getting this:




EDIT: Yes, I'm logged in, and I disabled Firefox privacy protections for the ssa.gov site, etc.

I recall having an issue a while back. I "think" the problem was that I WAS logged in. Try with out logging in to your account.

 

[The Cosmic Avenger]

I recall having an issue a while back. I "think" the problem was that I WAS logged in. Try with out logging in to your account.

That's it! Thank you!

WHY do they do that?? Ugh. Now I feel like I need to try to verify their numbers. But then, they do ask for your SSN, so I guess it's still based on your full pay records.

I'm not going to max out SS earnings, so retiring early could have a significant impact on my SSI. Not that I'm going to let that stop me!

 

[Al18]

SS calculator question comes up a lot of this forum. I prefer the https://ssa.tools/ which is NOT on the official SS web site. To use this calculator, you copy and paste your SS history from the official site to ssa.tools, and the calculator runs in your web browser - no data is transmitted over the web.

 

[ducky911]

ss uses your best 40 years...so if you retire early and have 35 years little difference but if you don't have 40 years retire early ss could be very different than how they calc it assuming you will work to 67

sorry edited 40 to 35

 

[JustCurious]

If I were to FIRE before that time, would the SS I eventually receive be considerably LESS than the amounts currently estimated?

That depends on how you define "considerably." It would probably be less.

 

[JustCurious]

ss uses your best 40 years...so if you retire early and have 40 years little difference but if you don't have 40 years retire early ss could be very different than how they calc it assuming you will work to 67

Social Security actually uses your best 35 indexed earning years, not 40.

Social Security benefits are typically computed using "average indexed monthly earnings." This average summarizes up to 35 years of a worker's indexed earnings.

https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/COLA/Benefits.html#aime

 

[The Cosmic Avenger]

ss uses your best 40 years...so if you retire early and have 40 years little difference but if you don't have 40 years retire early ss could be very different than how they calc it assuming you will work to 67

That's why I wanted to use the benefits estimator, to check that my estimated SS income is correct in my projected retirement budget. I usually don't plug numbers to my estimates unless I have a very good basis for them, but I like to rerun them every so often, in case I made an error or other factors have changed. The benefits estimator lets you set a retirement age.

 

[OddGuy]

You can use the site below whereby you can change the earnings estimates to be zero for X number of years before retirement.
The instructions are fairly straightforward.

https://www.ssa.gov/benefits/retirement/estimator.html

Thanks! I'd somehow overlooked that. The most useful aspect is the ability to change the age of retirement down to the month.

In my case, the numbers for early benefits are predicated on averaging $70,000 in taxable earnings from now to retirement, and while changing that number to $0 obviously reduces the estimates, they reach stasis once I add a bit of time.

Using my numbers, I can hit the same amount at 62 with $70k per year as I would with $0k per year until 63 and 1 month, and the number I currently have at 67 with $70k per year would be exactly the same if I waited until 68 years, 3 months at $0k per year.

Another version of "one more year", it appears!

 

[Offgrid Organic Farmer]

... If I were to FIRE before that time, would the SS I eventually receive be considerably LESS than the amounts currently estimated?

I quit earning a salary in 2001. [so basically for the past 19 years]

My annual Social Security summary has been showing very steady numbers for the past ten years.

So even though I am no longer paying into Social Security, I do not think that my benefits will change when I finally do begin to take them.

 

[sakowitzm]

Follow up re: Social Security Retirement Estimator.
When I click on how they make the estimate, one of the things it says is that your actual amount may differ, due to annual cost-of-living increases.

So.... let's say my estimate is $3,000/month and I am 61 years old, and COLA will be 2%/year for the next 9 years (until I start taking SS at 70.) My assumption is that the best estimate of my monthly benefit at age 70 is $3,000/month + about 20% of $3,000, allowing for the additional 2%/year for 9 years, compounded.

Thus the best estimate for me when 2029 actually arrives would be $3,600/month. Is that how this works?

 

[Dtail]

Follow up re: Social Security Retirement Estimator.
When I click on how they make the estimate, one of the things it says is that your actual amount may differ, due to annual cost-of-living increases.

So.... let's say my estimate is $3,000/month and I am 61 years old, and COLA will be 2%/year for the next 9 years (until I start taking SS at 70.) My assumption is that the best estimate of my monthly benefit at age 70 is $3,000/month + about 20% of $3,000, allowing for the additional 2%/year for 9 years, compounded.

Thus the best estimate for me when 2029 actually arrives would be $3,600/month. Is that how this works?

IIRC, any estimated annual COL increases are not built into the SS calculator.
Thus their estimate will always be on the low side until one actually reaches the benefit age.

 

[sakowitzm]

Thanks Dtail. That's what I thought i remembered, but these days trusting my memory is a very risky proposition. In my case, with 9 years to go, that's a significant increase.

 

[The Cosmic Avenger]

Thanks Dtail. That's what I thought i remembered, but these days trusting my memory is a very risky proposition. In my case, with 9 years to go, that's a significant increase.

Remember, the COLA is based on the CPI, so in today's dollars it should pretty much stay the same. That's why I don't bother calculating the COL increases. I'm thinking of retirement expenses and budgets in today's dollars, and I expect my portfolio to outperform the CPI (by a lot!), so it's simpler to just think of it in today's dollars. If you do estimate the SS COLA year over year, you should also adjust your projected retirement spending accordingly, with the exception of fixed-payment contracts like leases and mortgages of course.

 

[thefist]

Going straight to the estimator without logging in seems to be the trick. I had the problem months ago.
2019 was my first w/o earned income (age 54). This time, the estimator asked for income, then assumed 0 for the calculation.

 

[Hdhead]

I have had zero income since I was 52. Now am 66, just started receiving SS. There was no reduction in the amount reported since I stopped working. Just small incremental increases in the amount due to the inflation adjustments during those 14 years.

I just wonder what is in store for future beneficiaries since the system will be broke within the next 14 years.

 

[OddGuy]

I just wonder what is in store for future beneficiaries since the system will be broke within the next 14 years.

" According to the 2019 annual report of the Social Security Board of Trustees, the trust fu"nds that disburse retirement, disability and other Social Security benefits will be depleted by 2035. That does not mean Social Security will no longer be around; it means the system will exhaust its cash reserves and will be able to pay out only what it takes in year-to-year in Social Security taxes. If this comes to pass, Social Security would be able to pay about 80 percent of the benefits to which retired and disabled workers are entitled."

https://www.aarp.org/retirement/soc...w-much-longer-will-social-security-be-around/

 

[ShokWaveRider]

By 2035, I will be 6ft Under, Pushing Up Daisies, so WTF do I care?