Tag Archives: Social Security Administration

Politics, US

Social Security Audit Reveals 6.5 Million Active Accounts of People Over 112 Years Old

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A misreading of the findings of a March 4, 2015 inspector general audit of the Social Security Administration might confuse one into thinking that a miracle of modern science had been achieved. However, the approximately 6.5 million people at or over the age of 112 who are currently listed on the Social Security rolls are instead a testament to government waste, as the inspector general identified the fact that SSA lacks the ability to effectively purge likely-deceased people with unrealistic ages from its lists. “We obtained Numident [Social Security’s numerical identification system] data that identified approximately 6.5 million numberholders born before June 16, 1901 who did not have a date of death on their record,” said the report.

Consequently, these accounts are sometimes being used fraudulently to open bank accounts or apply for jobs. CNS News notes that the report on the audit said, “During Calendar Years 2008 through 2011, SSA received 4,024 E-Verify inquiries using the SSNs of 3,873 numberholders born before June 16, 1901… These inquiries indicate individuals’ attempts to use the SSNs to apply for work.” According to The Washington Post, a person identified in the audit was able to open bank accounts under Social Security numbers associated with people born in 1869 and 1893.

“It is simply unacceptable that our nation’s database of Social Security numbers of supposedly living people includes more than six and a half million people who are older than 112 years of age, with a few thousand having birth dates from  before the Civil War. Preventing agency errors by keeping track of who has died is a relatively simple problem that the government should pursue as a high priority,” said Senator Tom Carper (D-DE).

The Washington Post notes that Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) said, “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.”

The inspector general recommended four steps that the Social Security Administration could take to improve its Death Master File, but administrators with SSA responded to the recommendations by saying, “The recommendations would create a significant manual and labor-intensive workload and provide no benefit to the administration of our programs.”

Economy, Politics, US

Former Nazis receive Social Security payments from US government

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After WWII, many Nazis made an exodus out of Germany, and found themselves embedded in countries all over the world, including the US.  Now, an investigation has found Nazis who came to America have been collecting Social Security payments, even after they have left the US for other countries.

The Associated Press found that through a legal loophole, the US Justice Department would allow the former Nazis to continue to collect their Social Security payments if they agreed to leave the US or fled before they were deported.  According to the investigation, about $1.5 million had been paid out to former Nazis through this loophole by the turn of the century.

Out of at least 38 Nazis who came to the US after 1979 and began collecting social security payments, about four remain alive, and they all are rumored to live in Europe.

Jakob Denzinger is one of these former Nazis collecting payments while living in Croatia.  Denzinger was a guard at the notorious prison camp Auschwitz, and moved to Ohio after the war where, according to RT, he started his own plastic company.

Denzinger reportedly collects about $18,000 a year from Social Security, but he would not comment on these new developments.  Thomas, Denzinger’s son who lives in the US, did say his father would not give up his benefits because he “paid into the system.”

The Social Security Administration would not disclose information regarding the use of benefits to try and drive the former Nazis out of the country.

Agency spokesman Peter Carr said, “The matter of Social Security benefits eligibility was raised by defense counsel, not by the department, and the department neither used retirement benefits as an inducement to leave the country and renounce citizenship nor threatened that failure to depart and renounce would jeopardize continued receipt of benefits.”

However, even though the SSA denies paying former Nazis to leave the US, a piece of legislation in 1999 was meant to stop all benefits from reaching former Nazis, whether they were American citizens or not.  This legislation failed to pass at the time, but these new developments might raise the issue again.