Americans who lose a spouse would get more money from Social Security under a bill introduced by Rep. Joe Baca, but critics worry the plan would put more pressure on an entitlement system already on the verge of going broke.When a Social Security recipient dies, their surviving spouse receives a one-time payment of $255, but they miss out on their spouse's regular Social Security check for that month.
Baca, D-San Bernardino, wants to change that, giving surviving spouses a larger "death payment" and a check for the deceased's final days. ...
Baca's bill - called the Benefit Adjustment of Social Security Income Compensation, or BASIC - calls for increasing the size of the death payment from $255 to 47 percent of the deceased person's typical monthly Social Security income, with $255 as the minimum payment.
The bill also calls for paying Social Security benefits for each day - not just each whole month - a recipient lives. At present, Baca's office said, the spouse of a Social Security beneficiary who dies May 15 will not receive their spouse's check for May. Baca's plan would send a check for half the month, on top of the death payment.
I have no idea whether this has a chance but we ought to do something about the death benefit -- either abolish it or make it more meaningful. At the moment, it probably costs about as much to administer it as it does to actually pay the benefits. My opinion is that if we are going to have a death benefit that it ought to be several times the Primary Insurance Amount (PIA), that is the monthly amount paid to the primary beneficiary on an account.
Get rid of it.
ReplyDeleteThe 1939 Amendments to the Social Security Act provided a lump-sum death benefit of 6 times the primary insurance amount (PIA) upon the death of insured workers if there were no entitled survivors.
ReplyDeleteThe 1950 Amendments to the Social Security Act changed the lump-sum death benefit to three times the PIA to the survivors or estate of all insured workers.
The 1954 Amendments to the Social Security Act limited the lump-sum death benefit to a maximum of $255.
Social Security: Summary of Major Changes in the Cash Benefits Program:
http://www.ssa.gov/history/reports/crsleghist2.html
I'd be vaguely interested in the legislative intent or factfinding behind those downward changes in the 1950's.
ReplyDeleteMost likely, similar reasoning would hold for today and support total elimination.
The advantage of having it remain is that the application for the benefit results in an immediate notification to the SSA that a person has died. Well worth the cost of $255.00 in saved erroneous payments.
ReplyDelete($255.00 was 3x the maximum original monthly benefit of $85.00)
A#4--The three times muliplier is correct. But, when I came on in 1971 the minimum PIA was $70 (unreduced age 65). The minimum payment kept increasing under various computations amendments but the upper limit of $255 was never changed. The claim itself is cheap enough to process (thoroughly automated) and SSA can pick up on claims leads to other potentially entitled individuals. But, having to go through the Toll Free Number as I recently did is timeconsuming and annoying. I gave the TSR an A+ and the tedious process of getting through the voice prompts an F. FYI. Nancy Ortiz
ReplyDeleteGreat article. Thanks for the info, it’s easy to understand. BTW, if anyone needs to fill out a Lump Death Payment, I found a blank form here.
ReplyDelete