Amazing as it may seem, Social Security has no mechanism to automatically close files on people who die. This was revealed in a report by the Inspector General of Social Security.
As a result, there are open files for 6.5 million people who would be 112 years old or older. (I wonder if you tried to match up Democratic voter rolls with the Social Security list, how many matches you’d find) The IG said that by not maintaining the list, it has made the Social Security system rife with fraud and abuse.
The IG said that many of the numbers were used to open bank accounts and that illegal aliens use those numbers to apply for jobs.
“During Calendar Years 2008 through 2011, SSA received 4,024 E-Verify inquiries using the SSNs of 3,873 number-holders born before June 16, 1901,” the report said. “These inquiries indicate individuals’ attempts to use the SSNs to apply for work.”
Sens. Ron Johnson, Wisconsin Republican, and Tom Carper, Delaware Democrat, who head the Senate committee that oversees the Social Security Administration, issued a joint statement Monday urging the agency to clean up its files, CNS News reported.
“It is incredible that the Social Security Administration in 2015 does not have the technical sophistication to ensure that people they know to be deceased are actually noted as dead,” Mr. Johnson said. “Making sure Social Security cleans up its death master file to prevent future errors and fraud is a good government reform we can all agree on.”
Mr. Carper agreed, saying eliminating such errors by simply keeping track of who has died is a “relatively simple problem that the government should pursue as a high priority.”
Many suggestions were made to eliminate the problem but Social Security says it would be too labor intensive. Your public servants at work.