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Will I Be Deemed To File For Social Security Benefits If I File For Railroad Benefits At Age 62?

Well, I just finished reading your book, Get What's Yours and I need a little clarification on my particular situation. I was married for 21 years to a railroad worker. He started drawing his RRR benefit when he was 60 (he turned 62 last month). He also worked in the covered sector but I doubt he had enough years to qualify me for social security divorced spousal benefit. I remarried at age 59 (I know, I should have read your book earlier) but am now thankfully divorced again. My question is if I start drawing my ex-spousal RR benefit when I'm 62, (they've told me it would be $689.00 - half his tier I benefit) will social security consider me to be deemed? and make me draw my own retirement benefit?
Also, if I draw his benefit until I'm 70, will that really make my own retirement benefit that much higher? I currently make over the max SS income and mySS page shows my current retirement benefit to be $1410 per month at 62, and $2256 at FRA (thank you for the book lingo lesson) - I would LOVE to quit at 62, take his RR benefit, leave my SS alone and draw $2500 a month from my 401(k) investments. So, the final question is, if I quit work at 62, live on his RR benefit and my own savings until I'm 70 - will that increase the $2256.00 by the 32% you describe in the book?
Whew - that's a lot of questions, but your book only mentions RR retirement in the section on filing out the application.....Thank you for any help/direction you can give me!! Dona

Hi Dona,

No, you won't be deemed to file for Social Security (SS) benefits when you file for Railroad (RR) Benefits. So, it sounds like filing for RR spousal benefits first and waiting until age 70 to file for Social Security is likely your best option. By the way, your tier 1 RR benefits will end when you start drawing SS benefits, assuming that the SS benefits are higher.

If you wait until age 70 to file for your Social Security retirement benefits, the rate will only be 32% higher than your full retirement age rate (PIA) if you were born before 1955. If you were born in 1955 or later your full retirement age would be sometime after age 66, and you couldn't earn a full 4 years worth of delayed retirement credits (https://www.ssa.gov/planners/retire/delayret.html). So, for example, if you were born in 1955 making your full retirement age 66 & 2 months, the maximum DRC increase would be roughly 30.67%.

Best, Jerry

Posted: 
Jun 3 2017 - 7:16am
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