When Should You Claim Social Security?
By Andrew Joski, NSSA®
Founder of Joski Financial
Published September 14, 2026
Deciding when to claim Social Security is one of the most important retirement decisions you will make.
You can generally begin benefits at age 62, claim at your full retirement age, or delay until age 70. Claiming earlier provides income sooner but permanently reduces your monthly benefit. Waiting produces a larger monthly benefit, but you must fund the years before it begins.
There is no claiming age that is right for everyone. The decision should reflect your health, employment, other income, savings, spouse, and need for lifetime income.
Understand the Tradeoff
For someone whose full retirement age is 67, claiming at age 62 can reduce the retirement benefit by approximately 30%.
Waiting beyond full retirement age allows the benefit to increase until age 70. There is generally no additional benefit for waiting beyond 70.
The basic tradeoff is:
Claim earlier: Receive smaller payments for more years.
Claim later: Receive fewer payments initially but a larger monthly benefit for life.
A break-even calculation can estimate when the total value of waiting catches up with claiming earlier. That can be useful, but it does not provide the entire answer.
Social Security is more than an investment return. It is lifetime income that can help protect you from the financial consequences of living longer than expected.
Will You Continue Working?
If you claim before full retirement age and continue working, Social Security may withhold some benefits when your earnings exceed the annual limit.
Only your own earnings from work generally count, including wages and net self-employment income.
Your spouse’s income does not count against your earnings limit. Pensions, IRA withdrawals, investment income, and capital gains also generally do not count as earnings for this test.
Benefits withheld under the earnings test are not necessarily lost forever. At full retirement age, Social Security generally recalculates your benefit to account for months in which payments were withheld.
Still, the withholding can significantly affect your immediate cash flow. If you plan to continue working, estimate the effect before filing.
What Other Income Is Available?
Waiting for Social Security may require using other resources, such as:
Employment income
Pensions
Bank savings
Traditional retirement accounts
Roth accounts
Brokerage investments
Using those resources to delay Social Security can produce a larger future benefit. It may also create planning opportunities during lower-income years.
For example, someone who retires at 65 but waits until 70 to claim might use savings or retirement-account withdrawals during the five-year gap. That decision could affect taxes, investment risk, future required minimum distributions, and Medicare premiums.
Waiting is not automatically better if it requires taking unreasonable investment withdrawals or creates unnecessary financial stress.
Social Security should be coordinated with the rest of the retirement-income plan.
How Do Health and Longevity Affect the Decision?
Someone with significant health concerns or a shorter expected lifespan may place greater value on receiving benefits sooner.
Someone in good health with a history of longevity in the family may place more value on a larger benefit later.
No one knows exactly how long they will live. The goal is not to predict a specific age. It is to choose a strategy that works across a reasonable range of outcomes.
Ask yourself which risk concerns you more:
Claiming later and dying before receiving many payments
Claiming early and living many years with a permanently smaller benefit
That is partly a financial question and partly a personal one.
Married Couples Should Coordinate Their Decisions
One of the most common mistakes I see is treating Social Security as two completely separate individual decisions.
A married couple should consider:
Each spouse’s benefit
The age difference between spouses
Whether either spouse is working
Other household income
Health and longevity
The benefit available after the first death
A spouse may qualify for benefits based on their own work record or for an additional spousal amount based on the other spouse’s record. Social Security generally pays the individual’s own benefit first and then adds any applicable spousal amount.
The couple should evaluate the combined household result—not simply which age gives each person the highest individual benefit.
Survivor Income May Be the Most Important Factor
When one spouse dies, the surviving spouse generally does not continue receiving both Social Security payments.
The survivor will typically receive the larger applicable benefit and lose the smaller payment.
That means household Social Security income may decline substantially after the first death, even though many expenses remain.
For the higher earner, delaying Social Security may do more than increase their own retirement income. It may also strengthen the future benefit available to the surviving spouse.
Before claiming, married couples should ask:
What will the surviving spouse receive after either one of us dies?
That question may matter more than either person’s individual break-even age.
What About Claiming Early and Investing the Benefit?
Some people consider claiming early and investing the payments.
This strategy may work under certain circumstances, but it depends on assumptions about:
Investment returns
Taxes
Market volatility
Spending discipline
Longevity
Survivor benefits
It exchanges a larger future guaranteed benefit for an investment outcome that is uncertain.
A fair comparison should not assume strong investment returns without also considering market risk, taxes, and whether the benefits will actually remain invested.
Consider Taxes
Social Security benefits may be taxable depending on your other income.
Wages, pensions, traditional IRA withdrawals, interest, dividends, and capital gains can cause a greater portion of your Social Security to be included in taxable income.
Claiming Social Security can therefore affect decisions involving:
IRA withdrawals
Roth conversions
Capital gains
Required minimum distributions
Medicare income-related premium adjustments
This is another reason Social Security should not be evaluated separately from the rest of the retirement plan.
Questions to Consider Before Claiming
Before filing, ask:
Do I need the income now?
Will I continue working?
What other income and savings are available?
How is my health?
Is longevity common in my family?
How will the decision affect my spouse?
What income would remain for a surviving spouse?
What are the tax consequences?
Would waiting require excessive investment withdrawals?
Which claiming strategy best supports the overall plan?
The objective is not necessarily to maximize Social Security in isolation. It is to choose a claiming strategy that supports your household throughout retirement.
About Andrew Joski
Andrew Joski, NSSA®, is the founder of Joski Financial, an Idaho-registered investment adviser serving individuals and families in Boise, Meridian, Star, and throughout Idaho. He helps clients coordinate Social Security with retirement income, investments, taxes, Medicare, and survivor planning.
Not sure when to claim Social Security?
Schedule an introductory conversation with Joski Financial.
This material is provided for educational and informational purposes only and should not be considered individualized investment, tax, legal, insurance, Medicare, or Social Security advice. Social Security rules and individual circumstances vary and may change. Verify current information directly with the Social Security Administration and consult the appropriate qualified professionals before implementing a strategy. Investing involves risk, including the possible loss of principal.
