Divorce can bring a lot of changes in different areas of one's life. Some of those changes happen immediately, and some take some time to be felt. That certainly can be the case with Social Security benefits.

The bottom line with divorce and social security is that a person can collect Social Security benefits based on their own earnings history, or 50 percent of a spouse or former's spouse's benefit, if it is greater than her own, and 100 percent if the partner is deceased.

These rules apply to both genders, though women usually earn less over their career than men, and are more likely to be collecting lower benefits than they may be eligible for based on a former spouse's earnings history.

Divorced spouses wishing to take advantage of a former partner's benefit must have been married to their former partner at least 10 years, and must currently be unmarried, unless they were remarried after the age of 60. It doesn't matter whether the ex-partner is or was remarried or not, and collecting on their earnings record will not affect what any other spouses will receive. Neither are any other spouses involved in the process, since the Social Security Administration already has information about a former spouse's earnings history and makes it determination based on those records

It often happens that people are eligible for these benefits without knowing it. For those who have been determined eligible for higher benefits, the Social Security Administration will pay retroactive amounts of increased benefits going back six months.

In our next post, we'll continue looking at this topic,

Source: Wall Street Journal, "When a Divorce Pays Off," Ellen E. Shultz, January 14, 2012.