The Social Security Benefit Estimate Program for Personal Computers Description of program The Office of the Chief Actuary, Social Security Administration, produces a Social Security Benefit Calculator. There are two versions of the interactive program: one works on IBM PC's and compatibles running recent versions of the Microsoft Windows operating system, including Windows 7, Windows 8, or Windows 10. It is possible that it may work on older versions of Windows, but we have not been able to confirm this ourselves. The other version runs under older versions of the MacOS. Either version produces the Social Security benefit for an old-age, survivor, or disability claim, given the characteristics of a particular worker (such as birth date, past earnings, and type of benefit). It also produces the "primary insurance amount" (PIA), "maximum family benefit", the actuarial reduction or increment factor (for early or delayed retirement), and the monthly benefit amount (MBA). The benefit can be computed for either a new entitlement or a recomputation after initial entitlement. Several pages of output are printed in the application window, with summary results on the first page. Later pages display details of the benefit computation. The calculator can produce a benefit for any historical case from the first monthly Social Security benefit paid (1940). It can also produce a projected benefit, based on standard or user-specified assumptions, through 2095. Although we have tried to be as accurate as possible, this is not the same calculator as is used for official Social Security calculations and it may produce results that differ from an official calculation. In particular, for primary benefits, we have made approximations for pre-1965 benefits and for the frozen minimum PIA, and we only partially take account of disability non-exclusion calculations. In addition, the calculator is not set up to estimate dependent or survivor benefits in situations where the dependent or survivor also receives benefits on their own record, or survivor benefits where the benefit is affected by the worker's retired worker benefit prior to death. Based on experience to date, this calculator matches the official calculations very well, with most differences due to late posting of earnings to the earnings record, or different assumptions for projected benefits. The 2019.2 version, which takes all amendments to the law, and automatic adjustments, through 2018 into account, is now available from the Social Security website. It updates the 2019.1 version by updating the projected benefit increases and average wage increases with the assumptions from the 2019 Trustees Report. Special note for the MacOS version The MacOS version of the calculator is still under development. It has all the basic features that the Windows version has, and produces the same results for a given case. However, it is lacking the more advanced features of the Windows version, such as context-sensitive help. We hope to post updated versions as features are added. In addition, the Mac version does not work on Macs running Lion or newer versions of the OS X operating system. We hope to produce a Mac version which will work on newer version of OS X, but we have very limited resources to devote to that project at this time. Obtaining the program electronically The program can be obtained from the Social Security website. Go to http://www.socialsecurity.gov/OACT/anypia for more information about downloading and installing the calculator. Updating the program You can keep the calculator up to date by adding the annually announced automatic changes to the benefit increases and wage-related amounts. Those figures are posted annually on the SSA website in mid-October at http://www.ssa.gov/OACT/COLA/autoAdj.html. Or if you prefer, you can download the new version of the calculator with the new amounts. For developers only The source code (in the C++ computer language) used to create the calculator is available at no charge. There is also a version of the calculator that runs as a console application, avoiding the complications and overhead of the code required to make the windows in the interactive version. For more information about the source code or the console version, go to http://www.socialsecurity.gov/OACT/anypia/source.html. Office of the Chief Actuary Social Security Administration May 24, 2019