Tag Archives: Longevity

When to Claim Your Social Security Benefits

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WAITING TO CLAIM SOCIAL SECURITY WILL MAXIMIZE YOUR LIFETIME BENEFIT

  • If you claim Social Security at age 62, rather than wait until your full retirement age (FRA), you can expect up to a 30% reduction in monthly benefits.
  • For every year you delay claiming Social Security past your FRA up to age 70, you get an 8% increase in your benefit. So, if you can afford it, waiting could be the better option.
  • Health status, longevity, and retirement lifestyle are 3 variables that can play a role in your decision when to claim your Social Security benefits.

You can start claiming Social Security benefits at 62 and it can be tempting to take the money and run as soon as you’re eligible. After all, you’ve been paying into the system for all of your working life, and you’re ready to receive your benefits.

But you will not receive 100% of your benefits unless you wait until your Full Retirement Age of 66 years and 10 months if you reach age 62 during calendar year 2021. And if you wait longer, like until age 70 years young, you can receive even more benefits.

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If you start taking Social Security at age 62, rather than waiting until your full retirement age (FRA), you can expect up to a 30% reduction in monthly benefits with lesser reductions as you approach FRA, according to Fidelity Investments. FRA ranges from 66 to 67, depending on your date of birth. And your annual cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) is based on your benefit. So if you begin claiming Social Security at 62 and start with reduced benefits, your COLA-adjusted benefit will be lower too.

Wait to Claim

Health status, longevity, and retirement lifestyle are 3 key factors that can play a role in your decision when to claim your Social Security benefits. Unfortunately, you can not predict your future health status, but you can rely on the simple fact that if you claim early versus later, you will likely have lower benefits from Social Security to help fund your retirement over the next 20-30+ years.

By waiting until age 70 to claim your benefits, you could get the highest monthly benefit possible over your lifetime than if you start claiming at age 62.

And if you are married, you may be eligible to claim Social Security based on your spouse’s earnings. This may mean a significantly higher monthly payment for you if your spouse had a higher income than you during his or her prime earning years.

Basic Benefit Rules

After you reach age 62, for every year you postpone taking Social Security (up to age 70), you could receive up to 8% more in future monthly payments. Once you reach age 70, increases stop, so there is no benefit to waiting past age 70.

Members of a couple may also have the option of claiming benefits based on their own work record, or 50% of their spouse’s benefit. For couples with big differences in earnings, claiming the spousal benefit may be better than claiming your own.

Social Security payments are reliable and should generally adjust with inflation, thanks to cost-of-living increases. Because people are living longer these days, a higher stream of inflation-protected lifetime income can be very valuable.

Social Security can form the bedrock of your retirement cash flow and income plan. That’s because your benefits are inflation-protected and will last for the rest of your life. When making your choice, be sure to consider how long you may live, your financial capacity to defer benefits, and the impact it may have on you and your survivors.

References:

  1. https://communications.fidelity.com/pi/calculators/social-security
  2. https://www.fidelity.com/viewpoints/retirement/social-security-at-62
  3. https://www.fidelity.com/viewpoints/retirement/social-security-tips-for-couples

Healthy Aging: Resistance (Weight) Training

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One form of exercise, weight or resistance training, proves to be most effective for long-term weight loss

Weight lifting, also known as resistance training, helps us build strength, and also improves muscle size and can help counteract age-related muscle loss.

Recently weight lifting has become popular among those looking to lose weight.

Endurance exercises such as running and walking are indeed effective for reducing body fat. However, these exercises can simultaneously decrease muscle size, leading to weaker muscles and greater perceived weight loss, as muscle is more dense than fat.

But unlike endurance exercises, evidence shows resistance training not only has beneficial effects on reducing body fat, but it also increases muscle size and strength.

THE “AFTER-BURN EFFECT”

When you exercise, your muscles need more energy than they do when resting. This energy comes from your muscles’ ability to break down fat and carbohydrate (stored within the muscle, liver, and fat tissue) with the help of oxygen. So during exercise, you breathe faster and our heart works harder to pump more oxygen, fat, and carbohydrates to your exercising muscles.

Resistance training exercises should engage the largest muscle groups, use whole body exercises performed standing, and should involve two or more joints. All of these make the bodywork harder, thereby increasing the amount of muscle and therefore RMR. An effective resistance training program should combine intensity, volume (number of exercises and sets), and progression (increasing both as you get stronger). The intensity should be high enough that you feel challenged during your workout.

The most effective way of doing this is by using the repetition maximum method. For the purpose of fat loss, this should be performing between six and ten repetitions of an exercise with a resistance that results in fatigue, so that you cannot comfortably do another full repetition after the last one. Three to four sets, two or three times a week for each muscle group is recommended.

References:

  1. https://www.inverse.com/mind-body/resistance-training-heres-why-its-so-effective-for-weight-loss