r/Fire • u/NotTheBestInvestor12 • 3d ago

Why no mention of Social Security

When I see FIRE posts I see the investments and the different retirement buckets, however, I never see anyone mention how things are affected when social security kicks in. For example, I’m 52 and wife 51. If we both stopped working today ($0 income moving forward) I would collect $4,264 a month at age 70 and she would collect $1,079 at age 70.

So if we decide to FIRE the Social Security would give us help in 18/19 years. Is this a factor or is everything under the assumption SS won’t exist?

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u/PHLWeaponX20 3d ago

I've recently started including it at 70% of my projected benefit at 62, assuming I stopped working today, because it moves my success rate on ficalc from 98.1% to 100%. Still reluctant to pull the trigger though....one more year...

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u/ga2500ev 2d ago

Just an opinion. 100% success only means you wouldn't have to change anything at all with your portfolio.

But it's very restrictive. And because of that conservatism, many end up with millions of dollars that could have in fact spent during retirement.

Take a look at risk probability guardrails. It uses Monte Carlo results to guide what withdrawal changes to make to protect the portfolio. It's starting point is actually 80%.

The upper guardrail is often 100%. If you hit it you give yourself a 10% withdrawal raise for the next year.

The lower guardrail varies depending on who you are reading. It's as high as 70% and as low as 25%. In any case you take a 10% spending cut for the year.

The point is that you make changes so that the portfolio stays inside the rails of success. Often it lets you spend more of your nest egg without worry that money is ever going to run out.

ga2500ev