--- title: Social Security: Why It's A Women's Issue | TIME description: Women tend to live longer than men, earn less and must stretch their benefits to last their golden years. canonical: https://time.com/video/hURJLidR/ og:title: Social Security: Why It's A Women's Issue og:description: Women tend to live longer than men, earn less and must stretch their benefits to last their golden years. og:url: https://time.com/video/hURJLidR/ og:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/hURJLidR/poster.jpg?width=720 og:type: video.other twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Social Security: Why It's A Women's Issue twitter:description: Women tend to live longer than men, earn less and must stretch their benefits to last their golden years. twitter:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/hURJLidR/poster.jpg?width=720 --- # Social Security: Why It's A Women's Issue > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: Social Security: Why It's A Women's Issue [Watch (HLS stream): Social Security: Why It's A Women's Issue](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/hURJLidR.m3u8) (2:09)  _Published 2016-04-15. Women tend to live longer than men, earn less and must stretch their benefits to last their golden years._ --- Jul 27, 2023 7:56 PM UTC --- ## More From This Series [All Videos](https://time.com/video/) [Social Security is a Woman's Issue](/video/64kAlTEM/) ### Social Security is a Woman's Issue [Social Security's Earnings Test Explained](/video/jj7Qw79b/) ### Social Security's Earnings Test Explained [What Millennial Women Need to Know About the Earnings Gap](/video/8Ldv91xF/) ### What Millennial Women Need to Know About the Earnings Gap --- ## Transcript [ MUSIC ] Why is it that Social Security's such a big deal for women? Well, for several reasons, Larry. The first reason is women live longer than men. On average, a 65- year- old woman would have more than 21 years of remaining life And a 65- year- old man would have something like 19 years. Not only do they live longer, which means their money money has to last longer, but their earnings are substantially less than a man. That means that their basic retirement benefit, based on their own work record, is less than the husband. The good thing, though, is that when the husband died, which he'll typically do before the wife The wife will be able to inherit his check as a widow's benefit. Right. Just be careful because it'll be reduced if she takes it early. She can take it as early as 60. Or 50 if she's disabled. That's correct. Correct, but if she waits until 66, she'll get the full amount of her widow's benefit. That's the full retirement age right now. Right, the flip side of that argument though, is that while she gets her husband's benefit, because so many men file for their retirement early, their benefits are way lower than they would be if they waited until age 70. That can't be emphasized enough. The widow is gonna collect The check that the husband was receiving. And if the husband takes his retirement benefit early, that check is going to be so much lower than if he takes it at 70. Sure. So anybody who really cares about his wife Should be trying desperately to wait till 70 to take his retirement benefit. Not just to get his own retirement benefit higher, which is very important. But to make sure that his wife has this extra insurance if he's the higher earner. Well and we know that a lot of people can't afford to wait to claim benefits. We know that about 42 % of men are taking their retirement benefits the first minute they can get it. Which some of them have absolutely no other option in terms of no other income, but men and women should try and work as long as possible. I'm Phil Moler. I'm Larry [ UNKNOWN ]. And we're here to help you get the most from your social security. Absolutely. [ MUSIC ] ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Social Security: Why It's A Women's Issue","description":"Women tend to live longer than men, earn less and must stretch their benefits to last their golden years.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/hURJLidR/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2016-04-15T15:21:08.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/hURJLidR.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/video/hURJLidR/","duration":"PT2M9S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/video/hURJLidR/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}} ```