Financial troubles add to the grief of losing a spouse. Social Security survivor benefits may assist widowed spouses financially.
Surviving benefits are dependent on the deceased’s employment history. Although they are typically paid to surviving spouses, surviving dependent children and even elderly parents are sometimes eligible.
Social Security Survivor Benefits
If your spouse has sufficient work credits to be covered by Social Security and dies, you will typically be eligible for survivor benefits at age 60 (or 50 if disabled). Regardless of age, if you are caring for your spouse’s child who is 16 or younger or has a permanent disability, you are eligible for up to 75% of their benefit.
Even if you were divorced at the time of their death, you may be eligible for survivor benefits if the marriage lasted at least 10 years.
If your spouse passes away, they do not need to have reached Social Security age for you to be eligible for benefits. Social Security will determine a beneficiary’s benefits based on their primary insurance amount, which is the amount for which they would have been eligible at full retirement age.
Other dependent relatives are eligible for survivor benefits. A dependent child with a disability that began before the age of 22 or who is younger than 18 or who is still a full-time high school student at age 19 can typically receive up to 75% of their parent’s primary insurance amount. If the deceased provided at least 50% of a parent’s support who is 62 or older, the parent may also qualify for 75%.
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Reduction in Benefits for Early Claiming
You can receive up to 100 percent of your deceased spouse’s benefit if you begin collecting at your maximum retirement age. The full retirement age for those born in 1960 or later is 67.
Although you can begin receiving benefits as early as age 60 (age 50 if you are disabled, your benefits will be reduced. If you filed for benefits as soon as you turned 60, you would only receive 71.5 percent of your spouse’s benefit.
When taking your own retirement benefit, you can delay taking it until you reach age 70 to earn delayed retirement credits of 8% per year. When claiming spousal benefits, however, benefits
are capped at the entire retirement age.
Delaying Social Security benefits until age 70 will not result in a larger payment. However, if your spouse has already claimed Social Security and earned delayed retirement credits, you will receive the higher amount.
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