Dear Larry, I am a US citizen, 46, and have been living in Europe since 2013. I'm starting to worry about my SS situation and wondering if I should be paying into SS even while I am working abroad in Europe.. and if so, how do I do that? My jobs over there, obviously, are not contributing to it. Moreover, I went back to school in 2010 and am in a researcher position in Berlin still. Although I pay both US and German taxes, I don't know how I should be planning ahead so that I receive decent SS when I retire. My income is not surpassing 40K/year at this time but I hope it will soon improve.
Thanks for any advice you can offer.
Best,
Tamara

Hi Tamara. You aren't allowed to pay U.S. Social Security taxes on a voluntary basis, so there's no way to build up your future Social Security benefit while you're working in foreign employment. Your Social Security retirement benefit rate will be based on an average of your highest 35 years of U.S. Social Security covered wage-indexed earnings, so unless you resume work in the U.S. you'll undoubtedly have a number of zero earnings years included in your average. There's really nothing you can do to change that, though, assuming that you remain outside of the U.S.

Best, Jerry