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Social Security Spousal Benefits: One More Key To The Social Security Decision

Can a spouse collect on her husband's social security if she reaches retirement age before her husband? No. In order for a wife to collect Social Security benefits on her husband's income the following conditions will have to be satisfied:

1. The spouse applying for the spousal benefit must be at least age 62

2. The husband needs to be eligible to receive benefits, consequently he should also be at least age 62. Also, the husband will have to actually apply for Social Security retirement benefits in order for his wife to receive benefits based on his earnings. The husband may then elect to postpone receiving benefits. This course of action is referred to as "file and suspend".

To provide you with an example, if the wife is 62 and the husband is 60, the wife can start receiving benefits calculated on her income, but she won't be able collect based on her husband's earnings until he turns 62 and applies for benefits.

Then again, if the wife is age 66 and her spouse is only 62, then the wife can start collecting based on her husband's income (again the husband needs to sign up for his Social Security before his spouse can collect based on his earnings).

In the examples stated above, the wife can begin collecting benefits calculated on her own income at age 62 (assuming she has a minimum of forty quarters and also qualifies for benefits on her own), then she can change over to 1 / 2 her husband's benefit once her husband qualifies for Social Security.

A few items to think about before applying for benefits:

If a wife applies for her Social Security spousal benefit as determined by her husband's income when she becomes full retirement age (age 66 for individuals retiring now), then she will receive 50% of her husband's primary insurance amount (PIA). On the other hand, if she applies at age 62, then her benefit will be reduced to just 35% of her husband's PIA.

It doesn't help the spouse to wait until after reaching full retirement age to apply for benefits, as spousal benefits do not include delayed credits. Additionally, it doesn't benefit the wife if the husband delays applying for benefits because she won't get any rise in benefits that he will get by waiting to collect benefits.

If a spouse reaches full retirement age and is qualified to receive a spousal benefit or her own benefit, she may apply for the spousal benefit now and postpone collecting her own benefit in order to accumulate delayed credits on her own benefit.

You can collect Social Security spousal benefits based on an ex-spouse's earnings if you were married for at least ten years and you are also at present unmarried. For people with more than one ex-spouse which you qualify for spousal benefits, you will get the highest benefit you are entitled to. One edge that divorced spouses have over married spouses is the fact that a divorced spouse does not need to wait around for a former husband to apply for benefits as long as the couple has been divorced for a minimum of two years when she applies.

As a final point, the Social Security retirement program is gender neutral, so even though this article has assumed that the wife is usually the one applying for spousal benefits, if the wife earns more than her husband, the husband can sign up for Social Security benefits based on his wife's earnings.

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