Your Questions About Factors Affecting your Social Security Benefits
Q: I own a business, but do not run it myself. Would I still be eligible to receive Social Security benefits?
A: The SSA defines the word disability as being unable to complete any substantial activity that will earn you a living. They determine substantial gainful activity according to the National Average Wage Index, which gives a dollar amount per month. They consider a person to be working any day that he or she “is the owner or part owner of a trade or business even if he or she does not actually work in the trade or business or receive any income from it.”
The money your business makes may have an effect on your social security disability. If that income goes over the predetermined substantial gainful activity (SGA) level, the SSA may consider it a substantial income. The SSA determines this SGA level by doing a comparison of the income of your business to the income you received before you became disabled, as well as to the income of a healthy individual doing the same business.
Q: If I pass away while I am in the Social Security Disability application process, where does my claim go?
A: The SSA states that when an individual who was or could have been eligible to receive social security benefits becomes deceased, surviving family member can request a Lump Sum Death Payment. What does this mean? If you die in the while your claim for social security benefits is pending, your family may be able to get some of the benefits you would have been eligible to receive after the waiting period. To do this, surviving family members need to prove that their deceased relative did or could have qualified for social security benefits in the month that they died.
Only certain close family members are eligible for these survivor’s social security benefits. When making the claim, the family will need to provide information and records about the deceased’s social security benefits eligibility and application (if there was one). The SSA will also want to see information about the deceased’s overall disability, starting at fourteen months before death.
Q: What will happen to my social security benefits, once I am already on them, and I die?
A: When you are receiving social security benefits, and have paid social security taxes, some family members may be eligible to receive survivor’s benefits upon your death. In general, for family members to receive survivor’s social security benefits, ten or so years of work will be needed (though this does vary). Survivors’ social security benefits can be paid to:
• A widow or widower, who will receive full benefits at retirement age, and reduced benefits starting at 60
• A disabled widow or widower, starting at age 50
• Unmarried children under 18 (or up to 19 if attending high school)
• Currently disabled children who were disabled at less than 22 years of age
• Dependent parents over 62 years of age.