WASHINGTON — The newly appointed leader of the Social Security Administration clarified on Wednesday that deceased individuals aged 100 and older are “not necessarily receiving benefits,” countering claims that suggested millions of deceased centenarians are improperly obtaining payments from the agency.
Lee Dudek, the acting commissioner of the SSA who was appointed by former President Donald Trump, provided this clarification after both Trump and billionaire advisor Elon Musk made incorrect assertions on social media and during press conferences regarding beneficiaries supposedly aged 100, 200, and even up to 300 years old.
Although there have indeed been instances of improper payments, including those made to deceased individuals, the figures cited by Trump and Musk are inflated and misinterpret the data from Social Security.
Specifically, during a press conference in Florida, Trump claimed, “we have millions and millions of people over 100 years old” collecting Social Security benefits, remarking that such cases represent either fraud or incompetence. He argued that removing these supposed beneficiaries could enhance the program’s viability. Trump went so far as to mention a person listed in the system as being 360 years old.
Musk, who is leading a push within his Government Efficiency Department to eliminate fraud and wasteful spending, also made a series of posts on his platform, X, suggesting that the situation could involve supernatural elements, joking about “vampires” collecting benefits and emphasizing the absurdity of dead individuals being recorded as alive within the Social Security system.
Despite the alarming claims, it is confirmed that tens of millions of centenarians are not receiving any benefits. The confusion largely stems from the SSA’s outdated software system, which employs the COBOL programming language. Due to a lack of date types within this system, records with missing birthdates can default to an age greater than 150 years.
In March and July of this year, reports from the SSA’s inspector general revealed that there has been no updated system in place to accurately record death information, which led to around 18.9 million Social Security numbers for individuals born in 1920 or earlier remaining marked as active but without information indicating their passing. However, this does not imply these individuals are receiving benefits.
The SSA opted not to revamp its database, estimating the costs for such an endeavor could exceed $9 million. A July 2023 report from Social Security’s Office of Inspector General confirmed that nearly all entities referenced within the report are not currently receiving any payments from the SSA. Furthermore, the agency automatically ceases payments to persons once they reach 115 years of age.
Dudek, who took on his role following the previous commissioner Michelle King’s resignation, released a statement that acknowledged the agency’s ongoing pledge to transparency. In his remarks, he reiterated that the data causing the confusion merely reflect individuals in the SSA’s records listed as having a Social Security number but lacking an associated death date. He emphasized that these individuals are “not necessarily receiving benefits.”
Regarding the issue of fraud within Social Security, an inspector general’s report highlighted that between fiscal years 2015 to 2022, the SSA disbursed nearly $8.6 trillion in benefits, with improper payments accounting for less than 1%, primarily overpayments to living beneficiaries.
Moreover, the U.S. Treasury took back over $31 million from various federal payments that wrongfully went to deceased individuals, a recovery described by a former Treasury official as “just the tip of the iceberg.” This effort was made possible through a program established by Congress that granted the Treasury access to the SSA’s comprehensive death records for three years to identify and recover erroneous payments.
Experts have expressed concerns regarding the misinformation circulating about Social Security payments. Chuck Blahous, a senior research strategist, commented that while rooting out improper payments is important, insinuating that Social Security is a principal source of financial issues within the government is misleading. He pointed out that other programs, such as Medicaid, demonstrate significantly higher error rates.
Sita Nataraj Slavov, a public policy professor, voiced that the exaggerated claims by Trump and Musk could mislead the public into thinking that the government’s financial challenges could be easily resolved without compromising either taxes or benefits, a notion she firmly dismisses.
In response to the criticism, White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt reiterated findings from the inspector general’s report, clarifying that the SSA is actively working to eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse to safeguard taxpayers’ interests.
