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That doesn't really seem all that outrageous.

Here's one thing about the current system that's bothered me...

I worked. I worked for many years, and paid SS taxes like everybody else. But then DH and I had a baby, and since then I've been out of the tax-paying workforce.

I don't mind being able to choose between my own or my husbands benefits...

But it bugs me that if I become disabled, I have no SS protection. It goes away if you stay out of the workforce, and I'd have to work again for two full years before I was eligible again.

Maybe the system can't afford it, but the inelibility for SS benefits bothers me. I work every day of my life. My family counts on my work. (Childrearing,homeschooling, home maintenance, etc). That's accounted for in my eligibility to collect benefits based on my contributions or my husbands.

But If I lost the ability to make contributions to my household, there is no protection for me or my family at all. (which is why we have private insurance).

They should at least change the law so that healthy mothers who re-enter the workforce do not have to wait two years to be eligible for disability benefits.

Sarah, you are right. I stayed home for 16 years taking care of an ill husband and two learning disabled children. I was in a car accident a few years ago, which severely injured me and from which I am still disabled. My husband died suddenly, and I as I am not invested in SS I cannot get disability. I have been praying and trying to find a way to support myself. At 16 and 18 the boys are trying to help out but are really too young.

I would gladly have paid SS taxes of some kind in the past few years in order to have qualified. I always thought I would be able to get a job when he passed on, but I never reckoned on the car accident.