06/17/2026
"Is Social Security even going to be there when I retire?"
The answer is almost certainly yes - especially if you're in your 50s/60s.
But it might look a little different than the promise you were given 30 years ago.
It's looking more and more likely that benefits may just be paid out at around 75% - why 75%? Because that's approximately what's expected to be collected each year in Social Security taxes in relation to promised benefits.
This is one of those things that we can't do much about - but we can plan for the possibility.
For instance, if your Social Security benefit is projected to be $3,000/month when you plan to draw on it, we can run projections on $2,250/month of income instead. That will give us a good idea of whether your portfolio can support an additional $750/month of income.
If everything still looks peachy-keen with less income from Social Security, you probably shouldn't worry too much. If it blows up your plan, you probably want to consider working a little longer, picking up a part-time job early in retirement, or cutting back on your planned spending.
For some of my clients, a reduction in Social Security is going to be a really big deal, so we've planned around it. For others, it doesn't matter so much, so we focus our energy elsewhere.
If you're worried about where income is going to come from in retirement, it wouldn't be a bad idea to start talking to a financial planner.
