If you’re receiving disability benefits, it may be tempting to retire early or when you reach retirement age. Social Security Retirement may reduce your benefits if you retire early and claim retirement benefits rather than disability.
Early Retirement Impacts Your Life
Retiring early will reduce your retirement benefits based off of how many years early that you retire. The early retirement will have an impact on the benefits that you claim for the remainder of your life.
The benefits will not increase when full retirement age is met or surpassed.
If disability offers you health insurance, you will not be able to reapply for Medicare until you reach the age of 65.
Certain occupations, such as police offers, may receive disability benefits through special programs for officers. These benefits may impact a person’s ability to claim benefits from Social Security.
You need to make a calculated decision as to whether or not it will benefit you to retire early for the long-term.
Disabled Before Early Retirement Benefits
If a disability occurred before claiming early retirement, you can claim Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI). SSDI benefits may be higher than retirement benefits. If you claimed early retirement benefits because you were disabled, you may be able to prove this in court.
A person who can prove that the disability forced them to retire can have retroactive payments approved.
The government would pay the additional benefits that you would have received if you were properly put on SSDI.
SSD and Full Retirement Age
Social Security Disability, SSD, will no longer be paid to you if you reach full retirement age, which is 67 under SSD. If this occurs, you’ll be transitioning to the retirement program with no interruption to your benefits.
One beneficial change of reaching full retirement is that you will no longer have earning limits in place like you did under SSD benefits.
You can apply for a part-time or full-time job, and you will not be at-risk of losing any of the money provided in your benefit check. This is one of the main benefits of retirement because you’re able to still claim benefits and work if you want.
SSDI is different from SSD, so you may be subject to different earnings limits. Depending on how much you have contributed to Social Security, it may be in your best interest to stay on SSDI rather than claim your retirement benefits.
SSI, which is a needs-based program, which will have benefits impacted if you claim retirement benefits.
