From the New York Times:
Until recently, economic researchers were cheering an encouraging trend: Older Americans were staying in the labor force longer and waiting longer to claim their Social Security benefits, aiming to enhance their financial stability in retirement. …
Economists had documented that Americans were both retiring later and claiming their benefits later — until last year, when “all hell broke loose,” said Alicia Munnell, former director of the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. In an unprecedented surge, hundreds of thousands more people than usual suddenly filed for retirement benefits. …
From October 2024 to April 2025, [researchers] found, claims jumped by 267,000 compared with the previous year, a 13 percent surge. Typically, “the fluctuations were more in the 2 to 3 percent range,” [said a researcher]. …
In a 2021 study by the Boston College center, researchers showed more than 3,100 participants headlines about Social Security. One referred fairly neutrally to “a long-term financing shortfall,” while others used scarier phrases like “deplete its reserves” and “headed toward insolvency.” The accompanying short text stayed the same.
“With the headlines that were more fear-inducing, people tended to say they would claim earlier, about a year earlier,” than the control group reading the neutral headline, said Gal Wettstein, associate director of health and insurance at the center and the study co-author.
By 2025, this was no longer an academic experiment. Negative media coverage was “overwhelming,” he said. “People saw it every day.” …
A year later, claiming has reverted to more normal levels. From October 2025 to April 2026, new Social Security claims fell by 235,000, about a 10 percent drop. … The decline “effectively canceled out the surge.” …
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