Under the current law, a person can receive benefits as a divorced spouse on a former spouse’s Social Security record if he or she:
- Was married to the former spouse for at least 10 years;
- Is at least age 62 years old;
- Is unmarried; and
- Is not entitled to a higher Social Security benefit on his or her own record.
In addition, if a divorced spouse later remarries and that marriage ends in divorce, death or annulment, they can still collect on their first spouse's social security benefits. In practice, parties can collect social security benefits on multiple spouses as long as they qualify above.
The net effect of these benefits is to either encourage persons not to remarry and/or reward upper income divorced spouses. In either case, these benefits are costly to taxpayers.