I am 63 and retiring in March of 2019. My husband died at age of 33; 30 years ago. Do I qualify to receive any SS benefit as a widow, along with my Social Security benefit, which is greatly reduced due to my pension income being above the threshold and subject to being taxed at the SS 85% rule. Upon his death in 1988, while working, I received a family benefit/child benefit for my two children as part of his SS benefit to augment my salary due to the age of the children (18 mo and 5 years old). Thank you...

Hi,

You can't draw both your both your own Social Security retirement benefits and a full widow's benefit at the same time. Basically, you could only receive the higher of those 2 amounts. However, what you could potentially do is file either for a reduced retirement benefit or a reduced widow's benefit now, then switch to the other benefit at a later date.

It sounds like your best strategy would likely be one of the following:
1) File for reduced widow's benefits now or as soon as your earnings will permit at least some benefits to be paid, then switch to your own record at age 70; or,
2) File for reduced retirement benefits on your own record now or as soon as your earnings will permit at least some benefits to be paid, then file for unreduced widow's benefits at your full retirement age (FRA).

Normally, you would want to start out drawing the lower benefit first and then switch to the higher record when it reaches it's highest potential rate. Our maximization software could sort all of this out for you and help you determine your optimal strategy.

Best, Jerry