For years, I’ve been hearing silly rumors about undocumented immigrants and Social Security. And those rumors seem to have multiplied many times in this election season. Here are several examples.
Q: I’ve heard on the news that illegal aliens are getting $2,000 per month from Social Security. This is an outrage. I am a born and raised American. And I only get $1,400. How does the government justify this? No wonder the system is going broke!
Q: I read on the internet that government agents are handing out Social Security cards to illegal aliens as they cross the border. What a shock it was to learn this!
Q: I recently needed to go to my local Social Security office to take care of some business. And I was absolutely shocked to see that the waiting room was full of illegal aliens. What were they doing there? They are taking hard-earned benefits away from deserving Americans. And how can they get money anyway? They were way too young to qualify for Social Security!
I certainly hope most of my readers understand how absurd these stories are. But for those who have lingering doubts, let me tackle the allegations one by one.
I'll start out with the guy who was in his local Social Security office. I wonder: How in the world he could tell that the people he was seeing there were living here illegally? My hunch is it had something to do with their skin color and the language they spoke.
I can assure this person (and any other skeptical readers) that people living here illegally are not waltzing into Social Security offices to file for Social Security benefits. How do I know this? Well, primarily because anyone living here illegally simply does not qualify for any kind of Social Security. Also, consider this. If I were someone living in this country illegally, almost the last place I'd want to go to is an official U.S. government office where I might get caught.
Assuming there were some younger people of color in the Social Security office, my guess is they were either U.S. citizens or they were noncitizens living in this country legally and that they were in the office to get a Social Security number or to replace a lost card. In fact, most of the young people you see in the waiting room of any Social Security office are there for that reason. Replacing lost SSN cards is the most common service provided in a Social Security office.
And now, back to the rumors. That goofy one about the government handing out Social Security cards to anyone crossing the border illegally is so patently ridiculous there is just nothing more I can say about it.
And finally, how about the story that says undocumented immigrants are getting $2,000 per month in Social Security benefits? Once again, it is just absolutely not true.
Still, there is this undercurrent of suspicion in this country that somehow people living here illegally are messing up the Social Security system and draining it of funds. In truth, if you check with Social Security Administration actuaries, they will tell you that just the opposite is true. Their studies show that people who cross the border illegally and somehow manage to obtain a false Social Security number and work “above the table” are pumping billions of dollars per year into the Social Security trust funds but never collect a dime in benefits.
Of course, they are not saying that illegal immigration is good for the country. But they are saying that, in a weird twist of conventional wisdom, it is good for the bottom line of the Social Security program.
And now let me share a real-life story that illustrates what I just wrote about those actuarial studies.
A number of years ago, I was working as a public information officer for the Social Security Administration in San Diego. Part of my job was to run around town and put on Social Security seminars for local citizens. One evening, I was doing such a seminar in a library in a south San Diego suburb, not very far from the border with Mexico.
After my talk, a number of audience members came up to ask me questions. One of them was a guy in his 40s. His question to me went something like this.
“Tom, I’m sort of embarrassed to talk to you about this. But see that old guy in the back of the room? (He pointed to a 70-something weathered and wrinkled old man in the back row.) That’s my dad. And he came across the border illegally about 50 years ago. And somehow, he managed to buy a Social Security card off a guy selling fake numbers on a street corner in Los Angeles. He’s been using that number off and on ever since. I’m sure he’s paid many tens of thousands of dollars in Social Security taxes over the years. Is there any way he can get Social Security benefits?”
And I had to tell him no. As long as his dad was living in this country illegally, there was no way he ever would qualify for Social Security benefits. (And please understand that I am not getting into “paths to citizenship” or other issues for people living here illegally. I know nothing about that. I am just relating what I experienced that evening at the library in a southern San Diego suburb.)
So let me close by stressing these points. First: no one can get a Social Security benefit unless he or she has worked and paid Social Security taxes—or unless he or she is the spouse or child of someone who has. And second, no one can get any Social Security benefits if they are living in this country illegally.
