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Anytime your ss and a 3-1/2 to 4% draw is needed from your portfolio there is always the risk of running out of money unless one lives basically on the ss.
Personally I worked to hard all my life not to enjoy the max income my portfolio can generate plus ss when we planned our lifestyle . So our life is based on both sources . There is no way ever we would have a level of lifestyle that revolves around just ss if we have choices.
As long as we use our portfolio to live on there is always a risk of failure although it is low
I wonder what the people who retired early and advocate for SS at 70, who burned through 1/2 of their retirement portfolio to fund their lifestyle from age 62-70- will think when SS is cut 40% in 15 years. They burned through their money waiting and their SS. When they die the kids are left with scraps.
Those people who got a smaller SS check starting at 62 did not burn through their assets and SS is a smaller amount of their income.
Yup! As we move toward another correction (big or little), there is some nervousness that comes with having a small nest egg instead of a large one. Hypothetically, if one has a ton of investments, and the market has a short term hit of 25%, it may not be difficult to ride out any losses until they recover because the remaining may be enough to cover living in a high COL area- even if it takes multiple years.
If that same nest egg was only $100K, this case is no longer viable, and the SS becomes a bigger factor in long term survival. At that time, formulating cost of living with 'only' SS now becomes a priority.
We are closer to the latter scenario than the former, so are carefully balancing what we have, and it looks like age 67 turned out to be the magic number for us. We don't have to draw down assets too much, plus we had the extra 5 years of delay from 62 (due to working) which allowed our 401K/IRA/SS to grow enough to cover all living expenses+discretionary funds for play/investing, at our normal standard of living. That is not a high standard, but it is not a deviation from our last 35 years of life, and we have had a fun life.
1. If the markets tank, we're good.
2. If the markets grow, we're also good.
3. If the markets tank, and SS cuts of 30% go into effect in 2034, we are still above what we need for survival.
4. If one of us dies, the survivor should be good.
5. If the economy tanks, we get into another world war, locusts swarm our land, fire burns them all up and it is eventually put out by a tsunami, it is on to Plan B.
A Glock, or my meatloaf. One is quicker than the other, but the results are the same.
Last edited by MichiganGreg; 08-04-2018 at 09:02 AM..
Reason: typo; wording
For every minute you delay taking a pittance of the hundreds of thousands of dollars you paid in the biggest scam in human history, you ensure that Big Pharma & Big Health & Big Insurance will get the money that you were supposed to enjoy retirement with. The guy on Medicaid in the bed next to you gets EXACTLY the same care, and the same lack of pain medication because they got stolen yet again.
Of course, you're lucky to get even a penny back--many of the people I know didn't, and which many of my family members already know they won't. Cancer and the stress of those 80 hour workweeks that Big Business demanded of the Baby Boom doesn't give you those long lives. And Big Government wants to make sure nobody NOTICES THAT THEY SPENT THE BABY BOOM'S SOCIAL SECURITY TWICE OVER ALREADY--and there's nowhere near enough to meet even the needs of the survivors, plus good luck getting either immigrants or post-Baby Boomers to generate more taxes!
There are dozens of threads here about the advantages/disadvantages of delaying. Read through them, and you will gain a much better understanding of the trade-offs involved. Nothing is as simple as these 'countless' articles make them out to be.
It is incredibly simple, if you ignore the government scam artists. The earlier you take it, the better off you area, and the more of it you get to enjoy (instead of wasting it fattening the pockets of Big Business).
Most of us live long enough that delaying gets you more if you are not an investor. There are arguments that make sense and ones that dont. Those reasons are pretty iffy
I wonder what the people who retired early and advocate for SS at 70, who burned through 1/2 of their retirement portfolio to fund their lifestyle from age 62-70- will think when SS is cut 40% in 15 years. They burned through their money waiting and their SS. When they die the kids are left with scraps.
Those people who got a smaller SS check starting at 62 did not burn through their assets and SS is a smaller amount of their income.
Ss will never be cut . It is to important politically and country wise . Like everything else congress does it will be funded in the 11th hour. You saw how fast we came up with 12 billion to give the soy bean farmers or to fund Ssdi which went broke.
Retirement age can be be increased or spousal effected, that certainly is possible
Last edited by mathjak107; 08-04-2018 at 09:08 AM..
I wonder what the people who retired early and advocate for SS at 70, who burned through 1/2 of their retirement portfolio to fund their lifestyle from age 62-70- will think when SS is cut 40% in 15 years. They burned through their money waiting and their SS. When they die the kids are left with scraps.
Those people who got a smaller SS check starting at 62 did not burn through their assets and SS is a smaller amount of their income.
Personally I think your view of delaying is biased and skewed on many levels.
A Glock, or my meatloaf. One is quicker than the other, but the results are the same.
Lol. My wife makes a lentil nut loaf, God help me.
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