By Emerson Sprick

Insight Overview

IDEAS IN THE INSIGHT YOU CAN PUT INTO ACTION

These articles suggest that the way that the question of when to claim Social Security retirement benefits is framed can significantly influence pre-retirees’ decisions. The authors show three effective frames and their results: (1) Simply describing monthly benefit amounts if claimed at age 66 and if claimed at age 65 or age 67 leads to later claiming than the break-even framing used by the Social Security Administration (SSA). (2) Anchoring the claiming decision at later ages delays when pre-retirees expect to claim benefits. (3) Suggesting to pre-retirees that they consider a checklist of reasons they might delay claiming benefits before they consider a checklist of reasons they might claim early can significantly delay when they expect to claim benefits. Delaying benefit claiming would be beneficial for most—but not all—pre-retirees. The two articles this Insight considers suggest that using a lifestyle-informed life expectancy calculator to tailor the framing can help even those who should claim early make better decisions.