Social Security Administration

"You know you can't count on Social Security. " For years, that's been the scare-tactic pitch of unscrupulous investment brokers, annuities hawkers and their friends in Congress as they tried to peddle retirement deals to people reluctant to part with their money. The phrase has been repeated so often that it's become an article of faith for many who are still years away from collecting their checks. But it's not true, and for more than a decade a powerful rebuttal has appeared in the mailboxes of some 150 million Americans once a year, in the form of a statement saying how much their monthly check would be when they retire.

Social Security has gone digital. The federal retirement program, which last year stopped mailing out estimated benefit statements to everyone who has paid into the system, launched an Internet tool this month that can be used to view several aspects of your personal status. Here's how to use the online tool. Sign up: Go to http://www.ssa.gov/mystatement to create your online account. You must have a Social Security number, email address and U.S. mailing address, and be at least 18. Create a user name and password (save them someplace safe)

Social Security has gone digital. The federal retirement program, which last year stopped mailing out estimated benefit statements to everyone who has paid into the system, launched an Internet tool this month that can be used to view several aspects of your personal status. Here's how to use the online tool. Sign up: Go to http://www.ssa.gov/mystatement to create your online account. You must have a Social Security number, email address and U.S. mailing address, and be at least 18. Create a user name and password (save them someplace safe)

"You know you can't count on Social Security. " For years, that's been the scare-tactic pitch of unscrupulous investment brokers, annuities hawkers and their friends in Congress as they tried to peddle retirement deals to people reluctant to part with their money. The phrase has been repeated so often that it's become an article of faith for many who are still years away from collecting their checks. But it's not true, and for more than a decade a powerful rebuttal has appeared in the mailboxes of some 150 million Americans once a year, in the form of a statement saying how much their monthly check would be when they retire.

Gwendolyn S. King, a former aide to Sen. John Heinz (R-Pa.), was nominated today by President Bush to replace Dorcas Hardy as head of the Social Security Administration. King, a corporate executive, was director of Pennsylvania's Washington office when U.S. Atty. Gen. Dick Thornburgh was governor of the state.

Social Security has been so overwhelmed helping seniors cope with the new Medicare drug program that other services are starting to suffer, a senior government official said in a candid internal e-mail released Friday. A large backlog of cases is getting worse, and the agency is cutting back on audits that save the government money. "It's not a rosy picture, and the news doesn't get better," Deputy Commissioner for Operations Linda S. McMahon wrote to operations employees.

The calls from livid constituents to Democratic Assemblyman Richard Katz's Panorama City office complaining about upcoming cuts in benefits for the aged and the disabled began pouring in late last week. This week, as the calls swelled into a tide, Katz's staff investigated and found that the Social Security Administration office in Van Nuys was telling outraged recipients that Katz and two other Democratic state legislators were responsible for the impending reductions.

Louis Enoff, deputy commissioner of the Social Security Administration, has been named acting commissioner, taking over for Gwendolyn King who resigned, a spokesman said.

Gwendolyn S. King, a former aide to Sen. John Heinz (R-Pa.), was nominated Friday by President Bush to replace Dorcas R. Hardy as head of the Social Security Administration.

About 1 million retirees who work to supplement their Social Security income no longer have to report their earnings to the Social Security Administration. Under new regulations, the agency instead will get the information from W-2 tax reports received from senior citizens' employers. The Social Security Administration needs to know what senior citizens earn from jobs so the agency can calculate any required benefit reductions.

The Supreme Court gave a generally skeptical hearing to a recreational pilot from San Francisco who wants damages from the government for disclosing his HIV status to the Federal Aviation Administration. The case before the court Wednesday began in 2002, when the FAA heard a report of a pilot who had hidden his severe medical condition when he renewed his license to fly. Agents decided to check the records of 45,000 pilots in Northern California. They learned from the Social Security Administration that Stanmore Cooper had obtained long-term disability benefits in 1995 because of his HIV condition.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger may have a cameo role in a current film, but the real "Expendables" appear to be disabled Californians, the state employees who make disability decisions for the Social Security Administration and the federal dollars he is throwing away. Long before he was governor, bodybuilder Schwarzenegger lived by the motto "No pain, no gain. " However, as California's chief executive, his policy of furloughing even those state employees whose salaries are federally funded has given rise to a new axiom: "Lots of pain for no gain.

Like a zombie tromping through a Hollywood gorefest, the idea of privatizing Social Security still walks among us. The last promoter of the idea that people should personally invest their Social Security assets in the stock market was President George W. Bush, in 2001. With the dot-com crash still ringing in people's memories, the idea died in 2005. The market hasn't yet recovered from its most recent crash, but the monster unaccountably is back on its feet. This time it comes dressed up as part of the "Roadmap for America's Future" recently unfurled by Rep. Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.

As part of the $787-billion economic stimulus package enacted in February, Washington sent a $250 check to every adult on Social Security. every adult on Social Security. The same amount went to those enrolled in Veterans Administration, Railroad Retirement and Supplemental Security Income benefit programs. The purpose of the one-time payments was to boost consumer spending and help revive the economy. But in President Obama's view, once was not enough. On Wednesday, he urged Congress to spend $13 billion on a second round of $250 checks, saying, "Even as we seek to bring about recovery, we must act on behalf of those hardest hit by this recession."

President Obama urged Congress to provide an extra $250 each to about 57 million seniors, veterans and people with disabilities as the Social Security Administration prepared to announce today that there would be no cost-of-living raise in 2010. Social Security benefits are pegged to inflation, which has been negative this year. But by law, benefits cannot decline. This would be the first time benefits have not increased since 1975, when cost-of-living adjustments became automatic.

Millions of older people face shrinking Social Security checks next year, the first time in a generation that payments would not rise. The trustees who oversee Social Security are projecting there won't be a cost of living adjustment, or COLA, for the next two years. That hasn't happened since automatic increases were adopted in 1975. By law, Social Security benefits cannot go down. Nevertheless, monthly payments would drop for millions of people in the Medicare prescription drug program because the premiums, which often are deducted from Social Security payments, are scheduled to go up slightly.

Following months of negotiations between federal and local agencies, the Social Security Administration has decided to keep its office in the Under One Roof center open, according to Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Sherman Oaks). The Under One Roof pilot project began in 1981 with help from the nonprofit group Community Conscience to allow various social services agencies to operate in a single location with government paying the rent.

The Social Security Administration, expecting 10,000 baby boomers a day to soon begin applying for benefits, has put together an online service that will eliminate the need to go to a Social Security office. Most people would be able to apply for retirement or disability benefits in 15 minutes or less, the agency said Tuesday. The agency estimates that baby boomers will become eligible to retire at a rate of 10,000 a day for the next 20 years.

The Bush administration on Tuesday ratcheted up its effort to crack down on employers who hire illegal immigrants, part of a broader attempt to deal with immigration and enforcement despite legal challenges and congressional inaction. The Department of Homeland Security told the U.S.