quote:

Originally posted by Graniteguy:
So a married couple can make 182K year without triggering an increase beyond the $170 month?

That's not outrageous.

However, some of the other penalties and fees are.

Interesting and informative post for those of us approaching our 60's.

So you are OK with paying 40% more for the same healthcare socialist psudo-insurance because you make a dollar more than some arbitrary figure?

quote:

Originally posted by Flash-LB:
Not a big deal when your income is that high.

I don't see where $70.00/mo would kill someone making $91,000.00/year.

In fact, it could be said that someone making $91K would become knowledgeable about their tax risks - or their financial consultant would. After all, isn't their ability to manage these issues the real prevention?

The discussion tends to paint them as stumbling into retirement with no clue. Which isn't atypical with the media these days.

In some cases getting hit with the IRMAA surcharge is unavoidable simply because of your income. But as Sigmund accurately points out, there is one area where you can control your income and thus eliminate or reduce your exposure to the IRMAA surcharge. That's of course your withdrawals from your IRA. The withdrawals are taxable income. You can limit your withdrawals to insure that you either eliminate or reduce your exposure to IRMAA. But you need to remember to consider it when you do a withdrawal. Many financial advisers are aware of this, but many are not as well.[/QUOTE]

Except when you have to do Required minimum distributions starting at age 72 may take out your ability to limit your IRA withdrawals.[/QUOTE]

You are correct to point that out. I stand corrected. Thank You.

quote:

Originally posted by snidera:
So you are OK with paying 40% more for the same healthcare socialist psudo-insurance because you make a dollar more than some arbitrary figure?

That "socialist pseudo-insurance," as you call it, has served my wife and me well in our retirement.

For MediCare Parts A, B, and D, plus MediGap, we're paying about what we were for my old employer-subsidized health insurance when I was employed, and getting much better coverage.

As for the means-based pricing: Yes, that's a socialist mechanism. So, it turns out, is VA health care. Personally, I'd prefer to see "health insurance" and government health care involvement entirely eliminated, but that's never going to happen.

The biggest takeaway is that the whole process has become so complicated with Part B, C, D, IRA, 401K, income, IRMAA, markup, add in third party insurance options, it's absurd the amount of things that need to be addressed..

Yes. Very good point. These surcharges are not troublesome for the wealthy. For those that have mandatory RMDs they can be a burden. As was pointed out it is socialism. It would be very easy to move around those income guidelines to collect even more money for a government run health program.

Never heard of IRMAA.......until this year. in 2020 my wife and I (both have social security and pension from our jobs) cashed out our IRA so we could purchase a home and not have a mortgage. They are now taking $615.00 EACH out of our checks for medicare. My wife's social security check is now a whopping %9.24 a month. Yes, it hurts and will continue to do so for the next year. We are having to make cut backs each month, for example, we now buy Ramen noodles in the package instead of the pre mixed ones in the styrofoam cup.

Medicare takes all of my bride’s piddling Social Security check, plus some. The hell of it is, they can’t tell me how much extra they’re going to need me to pay until some unknown point this year when they audit the account or something like that. And then they’ll mail me a statement (via USPS-the guys who can’t consistently differentiate between PO Box 1430 and PO Box 1340), and from what the telephone helper said, they can’t email that info to me. The person I spoke to seemed as mystified by the whole deal as I was, and I got the idea she was reading from a script.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
That is exactly right. It is always about an adjustment made based on income several years back. I just hand them to my CPA to see if they are correct.

Just heard about how this works and had a bad year last year so pretty sure I'm going to be screwed shortly.
F*CK

I now make the great majority of my charitable deductions via QCD (qualified charitable deduction) precisely because of the lower AGI.

Yep. Good idea. Some control over where your money is going.