Retirement requires extensive planning, and it’s crucial to consider how your benefits will fit into your strategy if you anticipate relying on Social Security.
Despite the fact that as of November 2022, more than 70 million Individuals were receiving Social Security benefits, eligibility is not guaranteed.
Claiming Your Retirement Benefits
In addition to being at least 62 years old, you must have 40 quarters of coverage or credits if you want to be eligible to receive retirement payments.
These credits are only available to those who work and contribute to the Social Security system. The main source of funding for Social Security is employee taxes.
You must work and pay your own taxes if you want to be eligible for your own benefits. The Social Security Administration monitors your contribution via quarters of coverage.
For 2023, you can earn up to four credits every calendar year and receive one-quarter of coverage for every $1,640 you make in income. In order to be eligible for retirement payments, you must have 40 quarters of coverage if you were born after 1928.
It will take at least 10 years until you reach the minimum requirement of 40 credits because you can only earn four quarters of coverage per year. To obtain those credits, though, you don’t necessarily have to work for 10 straight years or even for four quarters of every year.
Quarters of coverage are awarded based only on income, so as soon as you make $6,560 in 2023, you’ll have already accrued the full year’s allotment of four quarters of coverage. It doesn’t matter.
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Social Security Retirement Benefits
You will regrettably not be eligible for Social Security retirement benefits if you do not accumulate 40 quarters of coverage. The SSA will not provide you with retirement benefits even if you are just one-fourth short.
This is why it’s crucial to maintain an online mySocialSecurity account at ssa.gov and track your earnings history.
Even while you might not be able to get retirement benefits, you might still be eligible for disability compensation even with considerably less than 40 quarters of insurance.
For instance, you only need six credits in the three years before the commencement of your impairment if you are under the age of 24. You must have a disability, at least for a 20-year period. But you must have a disability, period.
To see your potential benefit amount, you can create a mySocialSecurity account even if you haven’t yet retired. You can check your statements after logging in to see an estimation of your future benefit amount depending on your real earnings.
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