Offgrid Organic Farmer
Full time employment: Posting here.
That is horrible.
In my opinion, each spouse should take the other into consideration when planning their respective retirements.
Even on this Board, while some spouses are very cognizant of the survivor's needs, with others, it's all about what works for them - with seemingly no thought whatsoever as to how their spouse would manage if they died first.
With my military pension, they offer a Survivor Benefit Plan [SBP] but I as the servicemember am not the person who decides. My spouse was required to attend a briefing on it, and then she decided how much of my pension should pay into SBP for her benefit.
At one level of contribution she would get 10% of my pension, at another level of contribution she would get 20%, etc, all the way up to 100% all depending on how much of my pension, my wife decides should go into SBP.
If a servicemember expected to die soon, it would be a reasonable decision to pay into SBP at the highest level.
I did not foresee dying anytime soon, so my wife decided not to elect to put any of my pension into the SBP.