Originally Posted by buggyone

Always blows my mind when I hear of the naysayers of Social Security say they put more into it than they will ever withdraw.

I believe I read the average Social Security payment is $1400 per month. Multiply that by 12 and you get $16,800 per year. Assume you start getting that at age 62 and collect for 25 years, you will have pulled out $420,000 without counting COLAs.

In your 40 years of work, can you say that the 7.5% you put in Social Security equalled $420,000? In 2011, the maximum salary subject to Social Security was $106,000.

You might want to consider the matching employer contributions. Certainly any private sector employer includes this as a part of your compensation package.

The current average lifespan of an American may be 77.6 years but there's another figure out there and if I can figure out how I found it, I'll post it, that is more relevant.

I'm trying to remember the details - but it basically said that *if* you make it to 65, *then* your expected remaining lifespan was certainly more than the average.

That average figure includes, for instance, everyone who dies before 65 so the numbers are somewhat skewed.

No, do not add in employer matching contributions. I do not think any employer advertises a job as "salary will be $56,700 per year + Social Security employer contributions". I stated what YOU contributed.

Chances are that the retiree will draw MORE out than what THEY contributed.