Get What's Yours - Revised & Updated

The Secrets to Maxing Out Your Social Security

By: Laurence J. Kotlikoff, Philip Moeller, Paul Solman

Narrated by: Jeff Cummings

Social Security law has changed! Get What's Yours has been revised and updated to reflect new regulations that take effect on April 29, 2016.

Get What's Yours has proven itself to be the definitive book about how to navigate the forbidding maze of Social Security and emerge with the highest possible benefits. It is an engaging manual of tactics and strategies written by well-known financial commentators that is unobtainable elsewhere. You could try reading all 2,728 rules of the Social Security system (and the thousands of explanations of these rules), but academia's Kotlikoff, the popular press's Moeller, and public television's Solman explain the Social Security system just as comprehensively, and a lot more comprehensibly. Moreover, they demonstrate that what you don't know can seriously hurt you: wrong decisions about which Social Security benefits to apply for cost individual retirees tens of thousands of dollars in lost income every year. (Some of those people are even in the book.)

Changes to Social Security that take effect in 2016 make it more important than ever to wait as long as possible (until age 70, if possible) to claim Social Security benefits. The new law also has significant implications for those who wish to claim divorced spousal benefits (and how many Social Security recipients even know about divorced spousal benefits?). Besides addressing these and other issues, this revised edition contains a chapter explaining how Medicare rules can shape Social Security decisions.

Many other personal-finance books briefly address Social Security, but none offers the full, authoritative, yet conversational analysis of Get What's Yours.

Get What's Yours explains Social Security benefits through basic strategies and stirring stories. It covers the most frequent benefit scenarios faced by married retired couples; by divorced retirees; by widows and widowers. It explains what to do if you're a retired parent of dependent children; disabled; an eligible beneficiary who continues to work. It addresses the tax consequences of your choices, as well as the financial implications for other investments. It does all this and more.

There are more than 52 million Americans aged 54 to 69. Ten thousand of them reach Social Security's full retirement age of 66 every day. For all these people - and for their families and friends - Get What's Yours has proven to be an invaluable, and therefore indispensable, tool.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

Download the accompanying reference guide.©2015, 2016 Laurence Kotlikoff, Philip Moeller, and Paul Solman. (P)2016 Brilliance Audio, all rights reserved.

Lots of Info for Audio But worth Getting

Would you try another book from the authors and/or Jeff Cummings?

Yes but If they try to write more clearly by eliminating narrative stories that they scatter throughout in the book with more simple examples readers would have easier time understanding the many concepts presented.

What do you think your next listen will be?

They wrote one on Medicaid but I might skip it the writing style is hard to take in all the info.

How could the performance have been better?

Try to use more basic examples, these authors tried to use too many colorful story telling examples to make the discussion of social security ideas more approachable but the examples used tend to distract and confuse with unnecessary elements since the concepts are already so complex

Was Get What's Yours - Revised & Updated worth the listening time?

Somewhat but a tough time to listen to

Knowledge is Power

Would you consider the audio edition of Get What's Yours - Revised & Updated to be better than the print version?

I did not read the print version so I have no feedback on this.

What was the most compelling aspect of this narrative?

Learning the nuances of how Social Secrrity works.

What about Jeff Cummings’s performance did you like?

Yes, Jeff did a good job and the little vignettes and jokes added nice diversions to the stiff subject matter.

What insight do you think you’ll apply from Get What's Yours - Revised & Updated?

I reconsidered my approach to applying for benefits.

Must read book before applying for Benefits

This book enlightened me on just how much you need to CYA in regards to your social security. In others words what you don’t know may impact the benefits you may receive or not receive simply because you were not aware of them. Before going to claim it is imperative that one does their research and make the best decision for their situation. Pay particular attention to the deemed filing, spousal benefit and survivor sections of the book. These particular sections could cost you if you are not knowledgeable about them. Bottom line the main takeaway I got from this book is to not rely on the social security contact to do what is in your best interest.

Authoritative

An authority on all things Social Security: from Retirement benefits to Disability benefits to Divorced/Widow benefits, this book has it all. Even has solid answers about what will be available for my generation (Gen X and Gen Y).

In spite of the authors’ best efforts at humor, this was tough to read cover to cover. Even for someone who helps folks with financial planning. Will certainly keep it on the shelf for reference

wow, and I thought I knew a couple of things

And I'm a tax preparer, ex financial planner and turning 62 in 30 days.

I'm almost ....almost....embarassed I didn't know some of these things. But, hey....why would I. Outstanding writing and storytelling.

I listened to it on audible, while simultaneously reading. Also listened in my car, and several times broke out laughing in the car by myself at your senses of humor. thank you. Now I'm even signed up to get certification by an SSI vendor.

Very very powerful. I really enjoyed the stories.

A lot of good information.

there is a lot of good information. Well worth the time to listen to; whatever your age. The earlier you plan the better off you will be. This book will help you make plans.

Social Security for novices

Good, clear narration. The topic was not very interesting, most of the information was already known by me.

Repetitive and 7 years out of date

Poorly written and wildly out of date. Every other sentence refers to the years 2014, 2015 and 2016. Social Security is extremely complex and if this book were up to date it would be helpful. But as it is it’s mostly a waste of time.

Precision is an Issue

This book lacks precision. I also find all of the negative comments disengaging and a waste of my time. I think there was a lot of quality, and accurate information in this book but in the quest to avoid missing something they just say everything without regard to the audience which lacks precision regarding who is reading your book. I think if you could say what you need to say in about 1/5 of the time that you would make better points and save yourself lots of time. I did appreciate the level of research, but you are not on trial here. Thank you.

Out dated

Waste of time. Most of the time they are dwelling about rules that don’t exist anymore and how unfair it is.