Abaque 13 · Social Security claiming

When to claim, and who it is really for

Every claiming calculator asks how long you will live. That is the wrong question for a married couple. The higher earner's benefit does not stop at their death — it transfers, in full, including every delayed credit. This sheet reads the decision against two lifetimes.

Governing variableClaim age
Independent ofBalance · Return
Rules as of2026
Figures3
Sheet13 · Rev A
The asymmetry that decides it. Delayed credits pass to the survivor in full — wait until 70 and your spouse inherits the 24% raise for the rest of their life. But an early claim only partly hurts them: the survivor benefit is floored at 82.5% of your PIA no matter how early you claimed. The penalty for waiting is symmetric; the penalty for rushing is not. That single asymmetry is why the household answer sits later than the individual answer, and it is what Fig. 1 draws.
Inputs

Set the operating point

$3,000
The monthly benefit at full retirement age. Read it off your SSA statement.
Birth yearFRA 67
70
The one decision this sheet is about.
3 yrs
$2,400
A survivor receives the larger of their own benefit or the inherited one — never both.
85
90
Your monthly check
—
—
The survivor then gets
—
—
Break-even, your life alone
—
—
Best claim age for the household
—
—
Fig. 1

Two checks, one decision — and the floor under one of them

Reading the chart
  1. Enter on the horizontal axis at the age you are considering.
  2. The blue line is what you collect. The orange line is what your spouse collects afterwards.
  3. Left of about 64½ the orange line goes flat — the 82.5% floor. Claiming earlier than that costs you and costs them nothing further.
  4. Right of your FRA the two lines lie on top of each other. Every delayed credit is inherited.
Table view — Fig. 1
Fig. 2

The break-even everyone quotes — and why it misleads

Table view — Fig. 2
Fig. 3

The household view — where the answer actually lives

Table view — Fig. 3
Notes

The rules this sheet obeys

The arithmetic of claiming

Everything is expressed as a multiple of your PIA — the benefit payable at full retirement age. Claim early and it is reduced; claim late and it is increased.

For someone with an FRA of 67, that produces 70% at 62 and 124% at 70. The increase stops dead at 70; there is no credit for waiting longer, and delaying past 70 is simply a gift to the Treasury.

The survivor rule, which is where the money is

  • A surviving spouse receives the larger of their own benefit or the deceased's — never the sum. Two checks become one.
  • If you delayed past FRA, the survivor inherits your benefit with the delayed credits intact. Waiting is the only way to raise a benefit that will be paid across two lifetimes.
  • If you claimed before FRA, the survivor gets the greater of what you were actually receiving or 82.5% of your PIA — the widow(er)'s limit. This is why the orange line in Fig. 1 goes flat.
  • The survivor must be at their own full retirement age to receive 100% of it. Claimed at , a survivor benefit is cut to about .

Where the individual answer and the household answer part company

On your own life, waiting from 67 to 70 breaks even at roughly age 82½, and from 62 to 70 at roughly age 80½. Those are the numbers every article quotes, and for a single person they are the right ones.

For a couple they are the wrong ones, because the benefit does not end at the first death. The relevant horizon is the second death. Widen the age gap or lengthen the survivor's life in the inputs above and watch Fig. 3's peak march to the right — usually all the way to 70 and then stay there.

What this sheet cannot see

  • The earnings test. Claim before FRA while still working and benefits are withheld — in 2026, $1 for every $2 above . Withheld benefits are restored as a higher payment later, but the cash-flow effect is real and this sheet does not model it. If you are working, claiming early is usually pointless.
  • Taxation of benefits, and the fact that a larger benefit can drag more of itself into taxable income.
  • Medicare premiums (IRMAA), which read your income from two years earlier and are deducted from the check.
  • Inflation. Everything is in today's dollars. Since the COLA applies to a larger base, delaying compounds slightly harder than shown.
  • Switching strategies. A survivor may take one benefit first and switch to the other later — often taking the survivor benefit and letting their own grow to 70. That can beat every line on this sheet.
  • Spousal benefits while both are living, divorce, child-in-care, disability, and the government pension offset — which was repealed in January 2025 and no longer reduces anything.
  • Simplifications in the model. The spouse is assumed to claim their own benefit at 67 and to take the survivor benefit unreduced. A survivor widowed before their own FRA would in practice receive less, or would wait — so the early-claim curves in Fig. 3 are, if anything, drawn slightly too kindly.

Authorities

Reduction for early claiming, 42 U.S.C. §402(q) and 20 CFR §404.410. Delayed retirement credits at 8% per year for those born 1943 or later, 20 CFR §404.313. The widow(er)'s limit, 42 U.S.C. §402(e)(2)(D) and (f)(3)(D). Retirement earnings test, 42 U.S.C. §403(b) and (f); the 2026 limits of and are INDEXED and re-set every January. Full retirement age ladder, 42 U.S.C. §416(l).

This is arithmetic, not advice. The formulas are statutory and stable; the dollar thresholds are indexed and go stale annually. This sheet models one higher earner, one spouse, and two death ages — a deliberately thin model of a decision that in practice also involves taxes, Medicare premiums, health, and whether you need the money now. Take it to a CPA or a fee-only planner before acting.
Indexed figures are re-set every January and this snapshot will go stale. Get notified when they are re-verified → · All fifteen sheets