You’re thinking of retiring at 60. You wonder what the consequences will be on your Social Security benefits.

By special request from a subscriber I show you EXACTLY what will happen. I even show you some of my very own Social Security numbers. Don’t tell anyone though!

The net result is that if you have a pension, say you are a firefighter, or a governmental employee, and can hang it up at 60. Should you continue to work for the next 6 years or so until your Full Retirement Age?

Well, in my example I show you how by doing so you could net an extra $500 a month at Full Retirement Age.

BUT! I think you should look at it another way. To work an extra 6 years to gain an extra $6,000 a year doesn’t seem like a good trade-off to me. Well, unless you really enjoy your job, or desperately need that extra cash.

Think about it like this. A 40 hour work week is 2080 hours of labor a year. To put in an extra 2080 hours for 6 more years is 12480 hours lost to work.

Say you live until 86, or 20 years after you reach full retirement age of 66. $6000 times 20 years = $120,000. So that 12,480 hours earned you all of $120,000 in extra benefits or $9.61 an hour.

Not a good tradeoff, in my opinion. Especially when there are tons of other things you could be doing to make $9.61 an hour. Youtube videos. Raise chickens out back and sell the eggs. Play weekends in a bluegrass band etc. Stuff you enjoy!

Or donate your labor to help your grandkids. Something.

So, I leave it up to you to figure out the best way to spend your years after 60 years old. But if you have a pension already, it’s just hard for me to see that extra $500 a month is going to make a huge difference in your life.

No pension and lots of debt? A ENTIRELY different story, of course.

But it’s for you to decide.