I am a dual citizen - Canadian and American. I have only ever worked in Canada. I have CPP there. However, I have not paid CPP since 2013/14. I married my American husband in 2006. I am told by Social Security that I can't collect CPP AND Social Security. I was told by Social Security that they could put together some Social Security based on my last 5 years of work (in Canada). During these years I did not pay CPP. Clear as mud? I don't know if the software can answer these questions.

Hi. It's certainly possible to collect both U.S. Social Security benefits and a Canadian Pension (CPP), but in order to qualify for U.S. benefits you'd either need to have enough U.S. work credits to do so, or your husband would have to be collecting his Social Security benefits. If you've never worked in the U.S. and you never paid U.S. Social Security taxes, then you couldn't qualify for U.S. benefits based on your own work history. Social Security does have a totalization benefit that combines work credits earned in more than one country, but you'd need to have worked and paid into the U.S. Social Security program long enough to earn at least 6 quarters of coverage (QC) in order to be eligible for even a totalization benefit. And, you'd have to have at least 40 QCs to qualify for regular U.S. Social Security retirement benefits.

However, even if you aren't eligible for U.S. benefits based on your own work record, if your husband is drawing his Social Security benefits then you should be able to qualify at least for spousal benefits from his record. You would need to be at least age 62 to be eligible for spousal benefits, though, and your spousal rate would be reduced for age if you start drawing prior to your full retirement age (FRA).

Your CPP pension would not have any adverse effect on your ability to collect spousal benefits, and if a Social Security employee tells you otherwise then you shouldn't believe them. There is a Government Pension Offset (GPO) provision that can cause a person's spousal benefits to be fully or partially offset, but GPO only applies when a person is receiving a government pension based on their work IN THE U.S. A CPP pension would not cause your spousal benefits to be offset (https://secure.ssa.gov/apps10/poms.nsf/lnx/0202608400).

Our software (https://maximizemysocialsecurity.com/purchase) doesn't calculate totalization benefits, but it doesn't sound like you'd qualify for a totalization benefit anyway. The software is able to calculate all of the regular types of U.S. benefits (e.g. retirement, spousal, child, disability, survivor), though, so you may want to strongly consider using the software to fully analyze the options available to you and your husband in order to determine the best strategy for maximizing your benefits.

Best, Jerry