Retirement and W4

Forum|Forum|27 days ago
May 13, 2026
1 reply
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I will be retiring on June 30th. Both me and my wife are collecting SS and she currently is working part time (about 13 to 16 hours per week). We got killed on taxes last year because we were over the limit for me working and collecting SS and her company failed to take out any taxes for her part time job. After some complaints from her, they appear to know be taking out taxes. I plan on possibly doing some contract work for my old company and possibly others. I would like to know going forward with my retirement, what we both should be claiming on our W4's for our retirement compensation from our investments and SS.

Ask the Experts - W4 - May 2026

KatieP1

Employee Tax Expert

The IRS Tax Withholding Estimator is the gold standard for your situation because it looks at your household as a single "tax entity." Since you are juggling Social Security, part-time wages, retirement withdrawals, investment income, and potential contract work, doing the math by hand could be tricky.

I recommend you take your time and carefully go through the interview. At the end, you'll be given an amount to use on the retirement withholding and on your spouse's W-4 for her job.

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