I can usually tell when a couple has only planned the version where both of them are still here. Retirement looks fine. Two Social Security checks, a house they like, guaranteed income covering a good share of the bills. Then I ask what the month looks like if one of them is gone in five years. The room gets quiet.
That quiet is the whole problem. You built a budget around two checks. One of them is temporary.
Say the higher check is $3,000 and the other is $1,600. Together that is $4,600 a month. After the first death, both do not continue. The survivor keeps the larger benefit. At the survivor’s full retirement age, that can be as much as the deceased spouse’s full benefit. The smaller check ends. Household Social Security falls from $4,600 to $3,000. That is $1,600 less, every month, for the rest of one life. If the two benefits were close, the cut is nearer to half.
While you are both alive, a spousal benefit can lift the lower earner to as much as half the higher earner’s full retirement benefit. After a death, the survivor benefit can step up to the higher benefit itself. Social Security pays the one that fits. It will not add your check to theirs.
What we tell the higher earner
We are pretty consistent on this, and we will bore you with it on purpose. The higher earner waits at least until full retirement age. If the assets are healthy, monthly spending is already covered, and guaranteed income is doing a lot of the work, we push that claim toward 70.
The reason is smaller than people think, and bigger. Each year you wait past full retirement age adds about 8 percent to that benefit, up to age 70. Those delayed credits do not die with you. They carry over to the survivor. So the $3,000 check in the example is not stuck at $3,000. If that figure is the full retirement age amount, and full retirement age is 67, three years of waiting gets it close to $3,700. The $1,600 still goes away. The check that remains can be a lot larger, and the survivor is the one who lives with that number.
We do not force 70 when the facts argue with it. If the household needs the income to live, or health makes a long wait a bad bet, full retirement age is the floor and we stop there. Claiming at 62 because a neighbor did is the move we push back on.
Kitchen table debates about this go nowhere. Someone’s dad lived to 96. Someone’s aunt died at 71. Both stories are true and neither one is a plan. We run the claiming ages through software that scores a short life, a normal life, and a long one, then shows the expected value. That number keeps us from falling in love with the scenario where everybody lives forever. We can also drop an early death into the model. That run is the one the survivor actually cares about. A strategy that wins if you both make it to 92 can look ordinary, or worse, if one of you is gone at 74.
There is some flexibility on the survivor’s side too. A survivor can start as early as 60, at about 71.5 percent, or wait until full retirement age for the full survivor amount. If they also have their own benefit, they may be able to take one first and switch later. We would rather map that on a Tuesday than leave it for the month after a funeral. And if the higher earner claimed early, the survivor amount can come in lower than the full retirement age figure people carry around in their head. We run it off the statements.
Filing alone
The missing check is the obvious hit. The tax return is the one that sneaks up.
In the year of death, a couple can usually still file jointly. After that, unless there is a dependent child and you qualify for the limited surviving spouse status, the survivor files single. People call this the widow’s tax, and the name is a little grim, but the math is plain. For 2026 the standard deduction is $32,200 on a joint return and $16,100 for a single filer. The remaining Social Security, the portfolio, and any guaranteed income land on a smaller deduction and tighter brackets. The household got smaller. The tax bill often did not.
Medicare can do the same trick. The income surcharge, IRMAA, looks back two years. For 2026 the first threshold is $218,000 for a married couple and $109,000 for a single person. A household at $180,000 can sit under the line together and over it alone. Cross that single filer line and Part B goes from $202.90 to $284.10, plus $14.50 on the drug plan. That is the first step, not the last.
A spouse’s death is a reason to ask Social Security to recalculate a surcharge that was based on a joint return and a household that no longer exists. Ask. It does not file itself. Once you are filing single for real, the narrower brackets are just the rule.
Guaranteed income belongs in the same conversation. A single life option usually pays more while you are both here, and it stops when that life ends. A joint and survivor option pays less at the start so a check is still there afterward. Sometimes the survivor keeps all of it. Sometimes half. A lot of those elections are permanent, and they were made in a year when both of you felt fine.
A lump sum can feel like the clever choice. Sometimes it is. Sometimes the survivor is selling shares in a bad year to replace a deposit that used to show up on the first of the month. Part of that lump sum can be turned into guaranteed income, sized to the payment you are trying to replace. The rest stays invested, in the survivor’s control.
The house will not help you out of this. Property taxes, insurance, and utilities may ease. They do not fall in half. Neither does the mortgage. A spouse who handled the driving, the meals, and the medications was doing work. Some of that work has a price once they are gone.
Bottom line
Think about what the plan looks like if one of you dies. Most people put this off, and the choices get made without them. A claim gets filed because the check is available. An old form decides which income continues. The tax return keeps two names on it until, one day, it has one.
Three questions are enough to start. Which check survives. What still gets deposited. What the tax bill looks like alone.
If you do not know the answers, the plan is not finished. Figure them out while you can still do it together.
Disclosures
This material has been prepared for informational purposes only and should not be construed as a solicitation to effect, or attempt to effect, either transactions in securities or the rendering of personalized investment advice. This material is not intended to provide, and should not be relied on for tax, legal, investment, accounting, or other financial advice. You should consult your own tax, legal, financial, and accounting advisors before engaging in any transaction. Asset allocation and diversification do not guarantee a profit or protect against a loss. All references to potential future developments or outcomes are strictly the views and opinions of Richard W. Paul & Associates and in no way promise, guarantee, or seek to predict with any certainty what may or may not occur in various economies and investment markets. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future performance.