When Should You Start Collecting Social Security Benefits?
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When you are considering when you should start collecting Social Security benefits, it can be a hard decision to make. This is in part because you do not know how long will you live for.
If you expect to live longer and have other financial means, it makes sense to delay your Social Security benefit so that you will be able to maximize your benefit dollar, Bankrate says.
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You can begin to collect partial Social Security benefits at age 62; however, if you wait until your full retirement age, you will receive your full benefits.
What is your full retirement age? Well, that depends on what year you were born.
As a general rule, those born between 1934 and before, the age was 65.
Those born between 1943 and 1954, the age was 66.
Today, for those born from 1960 onward, the official retirement age is 67.
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For those who were born between those years, you need to add 2 months per year after the later year. For example, if you were born in 1956, your retirement age was 66 and 4 months (2 years past 1954 plus 2 months for each year.)
You may wait as late as age 70 to claim your benefit but you must claim at age 70.
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