You may not know this, but the maximum monthly Social Security benefit for retirees retiring this year is $4,194. That's not too shabby, right? It's about $50,000 annually (and, of course, subject to regular cost-of-living adjustments).

But that's the maximum, and it's hard to achieve. The average monthly benefit is more like $1,674 -- or about $20,000 per year. That's probably going to look quite insufficient to you, which is why you might need to be saving and investing for your retirement on your own, to supplement that.

There's a silver lining to that bad news, though: There are things you can do to increase your ultimate Social Security benefits. Here are a couple of them, along with some helpful guidance beyond Social Security.

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Source Fool.com