Some high-earning married couples may now be receiving about $100,000 per year or even more in Social Security retirement benefits, a new analysis finds.
To help curb the funding shortfall Social Security currently faces, policymakers could opt to cap benefits at $100,000 for married couples, or $50,000 for individuals, according to the research from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a Washington, D.C., think tank.
The trust funds Social Security relies on to help pay benefits face depletion dates in the next decade. Most imminently, the trust fund devoted to retirement benefits is due to run out in 2032, at which point just 24% of those benefits may be payable, according to the latest projections from the Social Security Administration.
“There’s basically a trust fund crisis in the near horizon,” said Marc Goldwein, senior vice president and senior policy director at the CRFB.
Social Security benefits for high-earning couples
Even if the trust fund is depleted, money will continue to come into Social Security through payroll taxes. Employers and employees each pay 6.2% toward the program, up to a taxable maximum, on wages and salary earnings. In 2026, that limit is $184,500.
Workers who continuously meet that cap year after year eventually become eligible for the maximum retirement benefits.
Today, the highest-income couples — where both individuals earned the taxable maximum for at least 35 years and who start benefits at the full retirement age (typically age 66 to 67) — may receive around $100,000 a year in Social Security benefits.
In 2026, a maximum-earning couple who retires at their full retirement age of 66 and 10 months will receive about $99,600 in combined annual benefits, according to CRFB. A couple who claims at age 67 this year will receive $101,000.
This currently includes just a “tiny fraction” of couples in the near term, according to the CRFB.
About 1 million beneficiaries receive benefits of $50,000 or more annually, the CRFB calculates. For married beneficiaries who both fall into that category, that amounts to $100,000 or more.
Social Security currently provides monthly payments to more than 75 million Americans, including Supplemental Security Income beneficiaries.
How ‘six-figure limit’ on benefits could work
People line up outside the Social Security Administration office in San Francisco.
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Putting a cap on Social Security benefits — $100,000 for couples and $50,000 for individuals — would help slow the growth of payments to the wealthiest retirees, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget research.
“An income security program designed to keep seniors out of poverty, designed to ensure an adequate level of retirement income, shouldn’t be paying six figures,” Goldwein said. “And it particularly shouldn’t be paying six figures when it can’t afford to pay most people their scheduled benefits.”
The cap — which the think tank calls a “six-figure limit” — would be adjusted based on beneficiaries’ ages when they begin collecting benefits.
For married couples, the $100,000 limit would apply to benefit claims at full retirement age, which is currently age 66 to 67, depending on year of birth. If instead the couple waits until age 70 to start benefits, their limit would instead be $124,000 to reflect the delayed retirement credits they would receive for starting later. If they claim at age 62, the earliest eligibility age, their limit would be reduced to $70,000.
The $100,000 cap would be indexed over time, which could be done in different ways, the research notes. For example, the six-figure limit could be indexed to inflation; frozen at $100,000 in nominal terms for 20 years and then indexed to average wage growth; or kept at $100,000 for 30 years and then indexed to wage growth.
All three methods would generate meaningful savings for Social Security, according to the CRFB.
Applying a $100,000 cap on couples’ benefits, and indexing that limit to inflation, would save an estimated $100 billion over 10 years and close one-fifth of Social Security’s 75-year solvency gap, the CRFB estimates.
Multiple ways to address Social Security shortfall
Lawmakers may choose from a menu of choices to help shore up Social Security’s funding. Broadly, that could include benefit cuts, tax increases or a combination of both.
Most individuals — 82% — say that they would prefer a combination of increased revenues and targeted benefit improvements, according to a 2024 survey from the National Academy of Social Insurance, AARP, National Institute on Retirement Security and U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
Among respondents’ preferred choices would be reducing benefits for beneficiaries with higher incomes, the research found. Notably, that research called for applying caps on benefits for those with retirement income, excluding Social Security, of $60,000 or more per year for individuals and $120,000 or more for married couples.
The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget’s proposed Social Security benefit caps instead focus on benefit income.
It may be difficult for an individual retiree to survive on just $50,000 in Social Security payments per year, if that is their only income. But if you’ve made the taxable maximum income for your entire career for over 35 years and don’t have income or savings outside of Social Security, “at some point you have to ask, is that the government’s responsibility to compensate you?” Goldwein said.
With the proposal, more people would be subject to the proposed caps over time, Goldwein said.
That may raise concerns among advocates who oppose benefit cuts. Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, said she worries about the CRFB plan “slashing benefits.”
“It’s younger people who really would be hurt by that proposal, because gradually it would hit more and more people and go to lower and lower levels,” Altman said.
Currently, for an individual living in New York, $50,000 is not a generous annual benefit amount, she said.
The CRFB’s six-figure limit proposal is the third in a series of ideas the group has recently put forward to address Social Security’s solvency. The think tank has also explored replacing the employer side of the Social Security payroll tax and capping the program’s annual cost-of-living adjustments.
“I mostly hope that this reinvigorates the conversation,” Goldwein said. “If people don’t like it, come up with your own plan.”
