my sil has been on SS TWICE...once for tweaking her neck and she was able to stay home for the entire time her kids were young and then she got a puffy job and worked a little here and there....
she fell off her ladder a short distance and from that episode she got back on SS disability for good...her and her good for nothing husband BOTH on ss disability ...its been a fun game for them....
Young people can work very hard as a single parent to make 45k in an honorable respectable position in a high tax state and next door may be a couple scamming the system, not working, and pulling in 60k between them. And when they are in danger constantly of loosing their job we wonder why the “safety net” government seems so appealing.
It isn’t envy of the scammers, but it is recognition that the wolf could be at their door from job downsizing or from health issues and this government that we have let grow into the Nanny may be their only fall back.
Doesn't that "just" accelerate retirement? I had a friend who got a fatal cancer when he was about 60 and considered magic disability SS. He said it would just bump him up to his full SS amount that he would have earned as if he were 66.
It's a sweet deal for your SIL, but the amount she gets--even at the younger age--is still determined by her work history and SS contributions, I think? Is that the case?