High-Stakes: The 80% Rule: How Much of Your Social Security Can They Legally Take?

Added: 2026-05-27

[00:00:00]Many people owe back state, federal, or local income taxes and they're approaching Social Security and they think, "I can't file because I owe back taxes, so I won't be able to get my Social Security." And that is not true.

[00:00:11]Like most things that people know about Social Security, they're urban myths or just incorrect. So, you can still file for Social Security if you owe a lot of back taxes. They will garnish. They will immediately take money out of each Social Security check, but not your whole check. The most they can garnish for back taxes is 15% per month. That's not bad. You can still get the majority of your monthly Social Security check until your back taxes are paid off. Now, some people owe back taxes and back child support and back alimony. And they could potentially also have student loan debt, federal student loan debt. But most of the most of that student loan debt gets washed out after a certain time. So, let's say you have alimony, child support, and back taxes. Can they take your whole check? So, the most they can take for taxes I just said is 15%.

[00:01:01]The most they can take for um child support, it depends on how many children you have with different people, and it depends on how many years you're in arrears, but the maximum they can take is 60% of your check. So, there we at if you have taxes and this, you could be at 80% 80% of your check. Okay, well, you're still getting some money. Now, you could always go to the government and try to negotiate a payment for your taxes that is less than 15%, which I would recommend you do. But if you're just like, "Ah, I'll just get on with it." They're going to take 80% in that scenario, the maximum if you owe for several kids with several different people. Now, if you're getting supplemental security income, which is a form of welfare, it's where they your income is so low that they give you some extra money. That cannot be garnished.

[00:01:53]So, some people are getting Social Security, but it's not very much. It's not enough to live on. So, they also get SSI, supplemental security income. So, they can garnish your social security, but they can't garnish your SSI. So, again, if you are on the flip side of this, let's say for example, it's uh you're the woman that is owed back child support. What do you do? As soon as your ex-spouse files for social security, that mechanism is supposed to happen automatically. That they're supposed to see that there's a outstanding back child support order, and the garnishment should begin. Sometimes the government does things efficiently like they're supposed to, and sometimes that doesn't happen. But you don't have to hire an attorney to seek the garnishment for back child support. No. If you are due back alimony, that doesn't just happen.

[00:02:43]You will have to do some work on your own. I have other videos that go into more detail to start the cogs turning to get that back alimony. So, if you're the person that owes the money, now you know what the maximum that they can take is.

[00:02:57]And if you're the person that is due the money, you need to know that you can only get those garnishments as long as the person is drawing social security and alive. So, if you've gone through the process to get all the cogs turning, and now you're getting the the rear rearages from your ex-spouse, if your ex-spouse dies, it stops. So, send that guy some vitamin supplements. Keep that guy healthy.

[00:03:18]If you learned something today, please share this with your friends cuz they don't know this stuff either. And please follow my channel. Share it with your friends. Like, comment, you know what you have to do to make YouTube show this video to other retirees so that we can help even more people with these difficult retirement questions. Our family is called the medicarefamily.com.

[00:03:35]We help people with Medicare insurance.

[00:03:38]Our help is free in all 50 states. If you have more questions about social security supplemental, we can't help you with that. I do these educational videos to put out free information to help you, but you can't call our office or book a free appointment unless you need help with your Medicare component of retirement. Thanks for watching. If you like this video, you might really like this video. Check it out. And we'd appreciate if you subscribe to our channel so you never miss a great video.

[00:04:04]We put out one every week. Check in the description below this video for a link to our cheat sheet on Social Security and Medicare. And you can also give us a comment if you have a specific question.

[00:04:15]Always feel free to call us or email us at The Medicare Family.