The New York Post is running an article in which Senator Joni Ernst criticizes Social Security for making payments to dead people. The tone of the article suggests there's some awful scandal going on. However, it doesn't give the entire context showing that payments to dead people are a tiny portion of benefits paid and that Social Security makes extensive efforts to prevent the overpayments. Social Security's efforts to identify dead beneficiaries are so successful that the agency's Death Master File is widely used in the financial industry to prevent fraud. They use it because they can't do better. Most notably the article includes no suggestion on how the agency could do a better job of identifying dead people.
I sometimes think that if Republican leaders had their way the Social Security Administration would spend as much money trying to find fraud as it does to make benefit payments. Why are they so obsessed with fraud? Because they hate the very existence of Social Security and want proof that it's fatally flawed.
They‘re also obsessed with fraud because their dumb voters are. Republicans love to complain about how unfair it is that they have to pay taxes. Then they insist any social programs be means tested to ensure only the poorest of the poor benefit. Then they turn around and complain that their money is being spent ln poor people and fraudsters, and not on them. It’s an endless feedback loop of idiocy and perceived victimhood that defines the party.
ReplyDeleteSenator Joni Ernst has an affection for the afterlife.
ReplyDeleteErnst posted a video to her Instagram story Saturday where she spoke directly to camera, apparently from a cemetery.
"Hello everyone. I would like to take this opportunity to sincerely apologize for a statement that I made yesterday at my town hall," she began, before describing the incident.
"I made an incorrect assumption that everyone in the auditorium understood that yes, we are all going to perish from this Earth," she said. "So I apologize. And I’m really, really glad that I did not have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy as well.
But for those that would like to see eternal and everlasting life, I encourage you to embrace my lord and savior, Jesus Christ," she added.
That was, um...unusual, to say the very least. Of ALL places, she could pick to apologize, she chooses a cemetery, a place Jesus doesn't really hang out, it's more of a park for the quiet dead, not necessarily headed to the good place, or the bad place. I think a church (in her case) would have been more appropriate!
DeleteShe is a MAGA-MORON. They all live at the intersection of God, Jesus, and hostility to their fellow human being.
DeleteI don't know how the Senator expects SSA to go around and check if someone buried their mom in the backyard. If she truly wants this, she should massively increase SSA's administrative budget. But I would guess that an enormous percentage of SSA payments to dead people are ones where the person died mid-month and by law wasn't eligible for the payment. Those are almost always recouped in the next couple months. Congress could very easily reduce those improper payments if they changed the law to make people eligible for benefits in the month of death. I think that would also tremendously increase customer satisfaction with SSA--people hate when their loved one dies on the 28th of the month and their whole check gets clawed back, right when there are funeral expenses.
ReplyDeleteWhy are you so against finding and eliminating fraud?
ReplyDeleteLeland checking in…
DeleteCurrently about 12% of SSA's administrative expenditures goes toward program integrity. Should it be 50%? 90%?
DeleteThey've already found that there is little fraud, and the vast majority of the benefits are paid correctly. Some of the fraud has come from within, and even then it is rare. When someone dies, it is reported to SSA. I know first hand as I called SSA to make SURE the death of my father was reported by the county coroner, and sure enough, it was reported the day after his death. No more payments came into his bank account and the account was closed in 3 months (per state law) with no overpayment.
DeleteI was under the impression that the Elon and his DOGE flunkies fixed all of this. Surely they weren't just blowing smoke the whole time.
DeletePaying even one dead person fraudulent money is one too many. I applaud these efforts.
ReplyDeleteThe SSA fraud rate, as documented by extensive studies is 0.00625% of payments. Private disability insurance fraud rate is 8.9% of payments. The same people complaining about fraud vote consistently to limit SSA's budget, which you wouldn't do if you wanted them to pursue more fraud. Translation: They just want to cut your Social Security benefits and are making up excuses.
DeleteHire enough staff then, it’s simple. You want to rape the staffing level but catch all of the fraud
DeleteWhat efforts exactly? All they are doing is bloviating.
Deletegreat! Then you will presumably applaud Congress increasing SSA's administrative funding so the agency can hire enough employees to visit all 70 million beneficiaries around the world every month to make sure each one is still alive. Note that the money for this hiring would come from SSA's trust funds.
DeleteI agree. Oddly tho, they are inflating the numbers. Doge found very little fraud, but if they want to keep spending money on it, have at it. You are absolutely correct that one is too many, especially with the trust's in the condition they are in at the moment.
DeleteThis shows that you have a fundamental misunderstanding of stewardship. If SSA spends $10 million looking just for benefits paid to dead people and stops fraud of $150,000 a year, is it still worth it to you?
DeleteA MAGA supporter living in the A+++++ economy.
DeleteYet you and your party consistently moan about how we can’t even afford to pay for public benefits. Now you think we can afford to end fraud 100% of the time, even though doing so would be massively wasteful and likely require quadrupling (or more!) the cost of administering SSA and other programs? Play on, troll!
DeleteBecause they are always projecting! They are frauds and therefore expect everything and everyone to be as morally and ethically bankrupt as they are.
ReplyDeleteThe only good thing about Phony Joni is this--she isn't running for another term.
ReplyDeleteOdd that Sen. Irnst is so concerned about fraud that she decided not to run for reelection. She is not know for her fact checking prowess.
ReplyDelete"She is not known for her intelligence in general".
DeleteThere, I fixed that for you.
Someone like Musk comes out and makes it appear like there is a lot of fraud with his findings that millions of SSNs for people over 120 are not listed as dead. A logical deduction is that those people are still being paid although that is far from the truth. It would have helped had Musk said the numbers are listed as "alive" but SSA is not paying any of them. But that would have made DOGE look silly. No one wants to admit they are wrong so others occasionally take the word of Musk and others and are completely in the wrong.
ReplyDeleteThe jump to thinking that Republicans want to get rid of Social Security just shows your bias.