Quote:
Originally Posted by retiredguy123
Personally, I don't think the spouse benefit has ever been fair. Someone who never paid into the system should not receive a monthly check. But, millions of spouses are receiving a check based on their spouse's work record. Now, I will be one of them.
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I don't disagree entirely but the spousal benefit might have been a way to actually save money.
What if it was determined that the benefit was not enough to cover a husband & wife when only one had worked? Perhaps the benefit needed to increase to 150% in order to serve its intended purpose. But times change and the single-earner families were becoming fewer as spouses began working also.
If they increased the benefit to 150% because of the single-earners then the two-earner families would be getting 300% (two benefits at 150% each).
On the other hand, if they kept the benefit at 100% but allowed a non-working spouse to collect a 50% spousal then single-earner families would get 150% while two-earner families would get 200%. This is slightly more for the two-earners but significantly less than the other option. To reduce the 200% further would require a discussion about double-dipping and fairness, similar to the discussion that led to this thread.
So perhaps the spousal benefit was a way to provide the level of benefit a single-earner family would need while saving money on two-earner families.