Social Security Doesn’t Come To All Who Paid

[eridani]

http://inthesetimes.com/article/17616/social_security_doesnt_come_to_some_farmworkers_who_earned_it

Israel Morales, 44, is one of the thousands of migrant farmworkers hired to harvest New Mexico’s famous chiles. For the past five years, Morales, who asked that his real name not be used, has earned between $4,000 and $7,000 a year stooping to pick chiles in the hot fields. Much of that he sends back to Chihuahua, Mexico, to support his wife and two children, ages 16 and 22, both in school. His earnings are fairly typical for chile workers, according to the Border Agricultural Workers Project. But only a fraction of his earnings were ever reported to the IRS or the Social Security Administration (SSA).

Not that Morales hasn’t tried. For 2012, he filed a tax return listing his total income as $6,791. He worked for two contractors, or contratistas, that year, but they never sent him W2s. Yet the receipts showed that they deducted almost $200 in Social Security payments from his take-home pay. “Clearly, the contractors wrote down that deduction on a pay stub and never paid [it] because they never reported him as an employee,” says Sarah Rich, an attorney who worked for two years at Texas RioGrande Legal Aid (TRLA) in El Paso. Morales’s situation isn’t unusual. Tess Wilkes, a Santa Fe attorney who represents farmworkers, says contratistas underreporting workers’ incomes, or failing to report income at all, “is very widespread.”

Such fraud cheats not only the Social Security system, but also the workers themselves. Social Security benefits are based on lifetime earnings. When a contratista fails to report or underreports a worker’s income to the SSA, such fraud will reduce the Social Security benefits the worker ultimately receives–or render him ineligible entirely.

[Judi Lynn]

1. It's a nightmare for these hard-working people. It even affects Medicare, too.

I hope like hell word will get around, that those who know about this will tell people they know who are unlucky enough to be depending upon their employers for records, employers who don't report everything, to start keeping records immediately, and to be sure to get help with this.

Really ugly when people decide to cheat the poor, or unsuspecting, or trusting human beings doing the hard work for them. Sooner or later, they WILL have to face the consequences of the way they have treated their fellow human beings. They can't stay drunk or racist enough forever.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

2. Then there are citizens that die before they reach 62.

And worked and paid into it for years. Like my sister, who died at age 42.

[pipoman]

5. This is the nature of insurance pools. .

All of those years paying one doesn't know if they will live to 122, or die at 64 years 11 months 29 days...we hope for the former and accept the latter.

[glowing]

3. Or the men or women whose spouse dies, and they must

choose whose social security to continue receiving. Many times, women are dropping their benefits for their husbands ( in the future this will switch as there are women now who are in higher paying positions), yet it's definitely a forfeiture of "family" funds when one of the couples passes on before the other.

If the govt didn't borrow against social security and they raised the tax amount, it would be much stronger in its holdings.

[JustAnotherGen]

4. If the government would tax me

For SS the entire year - instead of stopping at about 115K - that would be a huge addition to the fund.

However, there too many middle class and working class Republican types who have been brain washed into believing that would be mean - for the working (which equates to poor) and middle class to get together and DEMAND they tax my full salary.

All I can do is continue to support financially and vote for candidates who agree with me - remove the limits.

I'm really worried about our Baby Boomers. We need to take care of them and they are rapidly aging into the fund.

[Nye Bevan]

6. Someome who earns $10 million per year pays the exact same SS taxes,

and receives the exact same SS benefit, as someone who earns $120k per year.

This perceived fairness is what has caused people of all income levels to continue supporting Social Security, and is the reason that the system is still in place (compare to welfare which was "ended as we know it" some time ago. By Democrats, no less).

[JustAnotherGen]

9. But it's not fair

And when I was single and bring in a little over 1/4 a year - I truly didn't miss the money when I was gone.

And then I married a millionaire.

We don't need the money they will "gift back to me" in June - and we don't need the money that my husband will NOT pay into his quarterly taxes for the rest of the year.

You have people in this country who do not begrudge paying more for those who got kicked in the shins in the first few minutes of the game.

It's not about fairness - its about what is right and what is wrong.

This is black and white to me. Crystal clear.

Too many people are too proud to go to a food bank or community kitchen. And asking elderly people who worked hard all of their lives to do that to make ends meet is just wrong.

[Nye Bevan]

10. If the SS contributions cap was abolished but the cap on benefits not retained,

then SS would quickly go the way of welfare in the 1990s. All of a sudden you would have many, many very rich people with an enormous financial incentive to elect legislators to "reform" SS beyond recognition.

SS right now is a rare example of a system that works well and is pretty much supported by everyone. It is very valuable to poorer people and insignificant enough to the very rich that it is not worth fighting.

If you have extra money that you do not need, or feel guilty about, there are many excellent charities that would appreciate your contributions.

[eridani]

11. Wrong. The benefit determination curve already has three sections

The first gives disproportionally higher benefits to those with the lowest incomes. The highest level line is a lot flatter, which results in proportionally less to those with the highest incomes. Add another line which is nearly flat, and high income recipient amounts can increase infinitely without increasing very much. The essential thing is that they still get high benefitis--just not proportionally hign.

[JustAnotherGen]

13. Actually that Comunity Kitchen?

I established it. Because money talks and bullshit walks.

[Logical]

12. SS is not and should not be means tested!!! It is not a handout! nt

[JustAnotherGen]

14. Amen

You realize they lowered the cap a few years ago to 108.5? Then they let it go back to the max.

They could increase the cap or take the cap off for a limited base and greatly increase the fund. They've played with it before.

I'm Gen X - we have boomers - a lot of them - they aren't prepared. It's not their fault that the rules of the game changed on them in their 30s and 40's.

And asking some guy who swung a hammer or woman who stood on her feet waiting tables all of her life to do than in their 70's is wrong.

We have to increase their benefits - and we have to ensure they have what they need.


I'm not a liberal because of grand ideas about freedom - I'm a liberal because I believe we have to expand our social safety net.

I believe in it. It's not means testing to tell a 42 and 46 year old couple who have everything they need and more to pay more to ensure we aren't staring down the barrel of a cat food eating senior citizen population in 8/9/10 years.

Now when I read (and I have at DU) We should tax everyone do they only make $15 an hour - I'm going to say that's stupid. But a few hundred dollars every few weeks isn't missed at certain income and wealth levels.


The only people I see or hear whining about that are people - generally Republicans - who want everyone to think they are diamond Jim Brady with their 40K in a 401K. And they are 50 years old.

The pension system that York International had when I worked for them 20 years ago - what company offers that?

Let's talk about the 80K I lost out of mine as part of the Global Double Crossing fiasco?

Let's talk about people losing their retirement when the banking industry imploded our country in 2008?

We need an expansion ofthe SS system so people know when that it will be there when they get older.

I would also like to see an expansion of prescription benefits. And elderly person getting their heart medication when they need it is the right thing to do. The Part Nightmare as my mom calls it is ridiculous. Many of these folks need additional insurance that they have to buy on a limited income. That's bullshit.

How does a woman in her late 60's /early 70's - who always made less, so always paid in less, and doesnt have that joint retirement fund to live on make it?

Doesn't matter - we are doing the wrong thing by not doing right by older Americans.

[rgbecker]

7. First basic about SS. You need to work 10 years (40 quarters).

That is in order to get Retirement benefits.

[Igel]

8. Morales' solution was simple. If painful.

He reports his income, as he says he did. (So his income was reported, just not by his employer.)

He pays the SE tax. He's in the system and gets credit for his income.

Sadly, he's also out whatever his employer collected allegedly on his behalf and didn't pay. And the portion of the tax that his employer would have paid for him. (But hey, there's that nifty deduction from your adjusted gross income for that portion of the tax. Just filled out those forms last night.)


And if Morales is here legally, there are other unpleasant recourses. Deductions made and not turned over to the tax overlords are frowned upon.