I know what many are going to think, is this guy off his rocker, there is no way to legally increase the size of your SSI or Disability checks, but trust me when I tell you there in fact is a way to get a larger monthly check, but it does take some work, as you will see.
But we first must understand the formula SSI uses to determine what the amount of your monthly check will be, at the time of retirement or at the time you go onto disability. They use a formula based on the largest 12 quarters of your lifetime earnings, in other words, the three highest paying years you worked will be the base from which they begin to determine the size of your monthly check. Understanding this method the government uses will help you greatly to understand how it is that you do have some power over the size of your monthly checks as well as the ability to increase the size of your checks, even if your already collecting monthly checks.
Now that we have established how the government uses those 12 quarters to determine your check size, the next and most important thing you must understand is that "all states are not created equal" when it comes to how much money is taken out of your earnings while you were or are working, and this is very important to understand because as important as those quarters are, how much any given state withholds from your earnings plays a major role in what your monthly check size will be. I will use an actual example of two people I know, who live in two different states. Helen worked for nearly twelve years as a dishwasher in Mass. before going on to disability, because Mass. withheld a much higher amount from her weekly earnings, she ended up receiving roughly $2,400 a month in disability payments. Steve on the other hand spent over twenty years working at landscaping in Maine, and Maine with holds a much smaller amount from your weekly earnings, so Steve's monthly checks on disability ended up being just under $1000 per month. Steve worked nearly twice as many years as Helen, yet his monthly checks were less than half of what she received. Remember the formula, it is not how many years you work, that has nothing to do with the size of your monthly check, it all comes down to those magic 21 quarters and to how much the state you worked in withheld from your earnings. The state of Maine withholds much less from a persons earnings than does Mass, no fault of Steve, but because of it he receives a much smaller monthly check than does Helen.
I spent some time talking to the fine folks at SSI office trying to understand all this, and was surprised at what I learned, which I have passed along in this article. I learned another very important lesson as well, each of us has the ability to increase our monthly earnings, weather it be for retirement purposes or for disability. Remember those quarters we talked about, that is the key to increasing the amount of your monthly check.
If your planning on retiring but have not done so yet, or if you have already retired, or even if your on disability right now, here is how you can increase the size of your monthly check, and I do want to add that the person at SSI told me the government would not be very happy with them if they knew they were giving this information out. You could only imagine how happy they would be if everyone was to double the size of their monthly checks.
In Steve's case, because he was already on disability, increasing his check size meant moving to Mass and working there for three years, this greatly effected what his 12 quarters were as well as how much money was withheld from his checks during those three years living in Mass., which more than doubled his monthly checks, once that was done Steve moved back to Maine and continued to receive the higher monthly check. Helen was just fine with the money she was making on disability and remained in Mass.. So what you need to do to get the most out of SSI and disability is to work one to three years in a state that withholds the higher amount from your weekly earnings, because those quarters the government uses to determine your monthly check size are not set in stone, and the magic number you are shooting for is 3 years, or 12 quarters.
So if you live in a state that withholds less from your earnings, you really want to strongly consider moving for a time to a state that withholds more, three years is nothing compared to getting a much larger retirement check for the rest of your life. And if your on disability, the same applies to you, every state has its own version of Vocational Rehabilitation, a government program that helps people on disability get back to work. Just like Steve, moving from a low withholding state to a state that withholds more will increase your monthly check size. If your already retired, and you research it and find out a nearby state withholds a higher amount from wages, you may very well want to consider moving for a few years and returning to the work force for one to three years to increase your monthly check you are already receiving.
Remember, the government uses a 12 quarter formula, or 3 years of your highest earnings, as well as how much the state you worked in withheld from your weekly earnings, that formula never changes, so in order to recieve the highest amount in your monthly check you need to work a full three years in a state with a higher withholding. But even if you worked for one full year, even than you would see an increase in check size. I put this information out there mainly for people who have or are about to retire, so that they can have more money to live off of and have a better life in their latter years.
