Thinking About Social Security – Requires Careful Thinking

“This is a mind-blowing chart,” Elon Musk proclaimed at a Wisconsin pre-election rally on March 30th.  He was referring to a graphic prepared by DOGE colleague Antonia Gracias that showed millions of noncitizens have received Social Security numbers since 2021.  The unstated but likely intended take-away for the audience: why are noncitizens eligible for Social Security?

This is at least the third salvo directed at Social Security by DOGE.  The first came on February 11th when Musk said of the Social Security database that there are "people in there that are 150 years old. Now, do you know anyone who's 150? I don't, OK.”  He later noted that 3.2 million people in the database were over 120: “Maybe Twilight is real and there are a lot of vampires collecting Social Security,” Musk posted on X. The clear implication – lots of dead people are probably getting Social Security payments.   The second charge came on February 28th when Musk called Social Security “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time,”  arguing that with falling birth rates and an aging population Social Security will collapse and not be there for current workers.

On the surface, these are strong, emotional and troubling claims.  Yet thinking about Social Security requires going beneath the surface.  Let’s take them in turn.

·       Are 3.2 million people over 120 years old collecting Social Security?  No one alive in the United States is over 120; the oldest living person in the world is 117.  Data from the Social Security Administration (SSA) shows that there about 101,000 Americans who are 100 or older and that claims of much larger numbers are mostly due to inaccurate data reporting, especially since electronic death reporting (which connects to SSA) is fairly recent.   While there are no doubt some fraudulent payments, such as survivors who fail to report someone’s death or people who steal Social Security numbers, estimates in the millions have no data to support them.

 ·       Is Social Security a Ponzi scheme? A Ponzi scheme pays a promised high rate of return to early investors using money from newer investors.  Since the scheme never has good investments to generate sufficient funds, eventually the money runs out to pay investors and the fraudulent scheme collapses.  Social Security, in contrast, invests in government-backed securities to ensure it earns sufficient returns and is professionally managed with government oversight.  It also has a legal requirement to pay: Congress has the obligation to ensure Social Security is sufficiently funded.  Unlike most Ponzi schemes, which fail in a few years, Social Security has been solvent since its creation in 1935.

 ·       Are millions of noncitizens fraudulently getting Social Security numbers? Millions of noncitizens do have Social Security numbers, but they get them through perfectly legal means – and have since the 1940s.  These include people who are legal permanent residents (Green Card holders, nonimmigrant visa holders with work authorization (e.g. students, high-tech and farm workers), refugees and asylum seekers admitted here legally and authorized to work) Those here illegally cannot get Social Security numbers. Less well-known, perhaps, is that since legal noncitizens and undocumented workers make up about 17 percent of the U.S. workforce, they contribute perhaps hundreds of billions of dollars a year to Social Security, helping to sustain it – and many never draw benefits.

There are, of course, legitimate issues with Social Security, including ensuring long-term financial viability, improving its systems and enhancing services to citizens.  Such issues can best be addressed through objective analysis and reasoned debate.  Appeals to passion and spreading misinformation make that task much harder.  They also lead to public perceptions that the system is riddled with abuse and not worthy of the public’s confidence.

In his successful defense of British soldiers accused in the 1770 Boston Massacre, John Adams reminded the jury of their obligation to base their verdict on truth:

“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."

We share the same obligation today in evaluating claims about Social Security.  Good citizenship requires sound, unbiased and unemotional thinking.

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