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Encyclopedia > Social Security number (United States)
Sample United States Social Security Card
Sample United States Social Security Card

In the United States, a Social Security number (or SSN) is a number issued to citizens, permanent residents, and temporary (working) residents under section 205(c)(2) of the Social Security Act, codified as 42 U.S.C. § 405(c)(2). The number is issued to an individual by the Social Security Administration, an agency of the federal government. Ostensibly, its primary purpose is tracking working individuals for taxation purposes and to track Social Security benefits. However, in recent years, the SSN has become a de facto national identification number, even though it is not supposed to be used as a form of identification. Image File history File links Ssi_card. ... Image File history File links Ssi_card. ... Permanent residency refers to a persons status such that the person is allowed to reside indefinitely within the country despite not having citizenship. ... The United States Code (U.S.C.) is a compilation and codification of the general and permanent federal Law of the United States. ... The United States Social Security Administration (or SSA) is an independent agency of the United States government established by law currently codified as . ... This law-related article does not cite its references or sources. ... Social Security in the United States is a social insurance program funded through a dedicated payroll tax. ... De facto is a Latin expression that means in fact or in practice. It is commonly used as opposed to de jure (meaning by law) when referring to matters of law or governance or technique (such as standards), that are found in the common experience as created or developed without... A national identification number is used by the governments of many countries as a means of tracking their citizens, permanent residents, and temporary residents for the purposes of work, taxation, government benefits, health care, and other governmentally-related functions. ...


Contrary to popular belief, there is still no law directly requiring a natural born US Citizen to apply for a Social Security number to live or work in the United States. Although a handful of people still live this way, it is becoming ever increasingly difficult to engage in normal acts of commerce or banking activities without providing one. Such prohibitions against persons that refuse to enter into what amounts to a voluntary government program, raises a variety of constitutional concerns.

Contents


History

The first SSNs were issued by the Social Security Administration in November 1936 as part of the New Deal Social Security program. By the end of 1937, over 37 million numbers had been issued. Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: New Deal The New Deal is the name given to the series of programs implemented between 1933-37 under President Franklin D. Roosevelt with the goal of relief, recovery and reform of the United States economy during the Great Depression. ...


Before 1986, people often did not have a Social Security number until the age of about 14, since they were used for tax purposes and those under that age seldom had remunerative employment. In 1986, American taxation law was altered so that individuals over 5 years old without Social Security numbers could not be claimed as dependents on tax returns. Since then, parents have often applied for Social Security numbers for their children as soon as they were born. (Note: The law does not absolutely preclude claiming dependants without a Social Security number, however as an issue of policy the IRS often denies such claims unless the issue is pressed.) President Ronald Reagan signs the Tax Reform Act of 1986 on the South Lawn. ...


Purpose and use

The original purpose of this number was to administer the Social Security program, but it has come to be used also as a "primary key" (a de facto national ID number) for individuals within the United States. This is a major example of functionality creep. Payroll, university student records, credit records, and driver's licenses are sometimes indexed by Social Security number. The U.S. military has used the Social Security number as an identification number for all service members since 1969. As a result, disclosure and processing of these numbers is of major concern to many citizens and privacy advocates. In database design, a primary key is a value that can be used to identify a unique row in a table. ... Functionality creep is what occurs when an item, process, or procedure designed for a specific purpose ends up serving another purpose for which it was not intended. ... Credit history or credit report is a record of an individuals or companys past borrowing and repaying, including information about late payments and bankruptcy. ... Driving licences within the European Union are subdivided into different categories. ... The armed forces of the United States of America consist of the United States Army United States Navy United States Air Force United States Marine Corps United States Coast Guard Note: The United States Coast Guard has both military and law enforcement functions. ... Privacy is the ability of an individual or group to stop information about themselves from becoming known to people other than those whom they choose to give the information. ...


Federal taxpayer identification number

The Internal Revenue Code provides that "[t]he social security account number issued to an individual for purposes of section 205(c)(2)(A) of the Social Security Act shall, except as shall otherwise be specified under regulations of the Secretary [of the Treasury or his delegate], be used as the identifying number for such individual for purposes of this title." See 26 U.S.C. § 6109(d). The Internal Revenue Code (or IRC) (more formally, the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended) is the main body of domestic tax law of the United States organized topically, including laws covering the income tax (see Income tax in the United States), payroll taxes, and excise taxes. ... The United States Code (U.S.C.) is a compilation and codification of the general and permanent federal Law of the United States. ...


Identity Theft

The SSN is frequently used by those involved in identity theft, since it is interconnected with so many other forms of identification, and because people asking for it treat it as an authenticator — it is generally required by financial institutions to set up bank accounts, credit cards, and obtain loans, partially because it is assumed that no one except the person to whom it was issued will have it. Ironically enough, Social Security cards used to have the caption "Not for identification", indicating that the cards and their number are not intended to be a form of identification. In 2005 break-ins into administrative and school computers led to large-scale identity theft, and a bill has been proposed which would make use of the social security number as identifiers in schools illegal. Exacerbating the problem is the fact that the United States has no national ID document and that the social security card contains no biometric identifiers of any sort, making it essentially impossible to tell whether a person using a certain SSN is truly the person to whom it was issued without relying on some other means of documentation (which may itself have been falsely procured through use of the fraudulent SSN). Congress has finally proposed new federal laws that will restrict the use of SSNs for identification and ban their use for a number of commercial purposes e.g. rental applications[1]. Identity theft (or identity fraud) is the deliberate assumption of another persons identity, usually to gain access to their finances or frame them for a crime. ... Authentication is the act of establishing or confirming something or someone as authentic. ... For other uses, see Bank (disambiguation). ... It has been suggested that Credit card industry be merged into this article or section. ... At Disney World, biometric measurements are taken of the fingers of multi-day pass users to ensure that the pass is used by the same person from day to day. ...


Structure

Information from (from http://www.ssa.gov/history/ssn/geocard.html)

The Social Security number is a nine-digit number in the format "111-11-1111." The number is divided into three parts.

  • The Area Number is assigned by the geographical region. Prior to 1947, cards were issued in local Social Security offices around the country and the Area Number represented the State in which the card was issued. This did not necessarily have to be the State where the applicant lived, since a person could apply for their card in any Social Security office. Since 1972, when SSA began assigning SSNs and issuing cards centrally from Baltimore, the area number assigned has been based on the ZIP code in the mailing address provided on the application for the original Social Security card. The applicant's mailing address does not have to be the same as their place of residence. Thus, the Area Number does not necessarily represent the State of residence of the applicant, either prior to 1972 or since.

Generally, numbers were assigned beginning in the northeast and moving westward. So people on the east coast have the lowest numbers and those on the west coast have the highest numbers. As the areas assigned to a locality are exhausted, new areas from the pool are assigned, so some states have noncontiguous groups of numbers. This article is about the city in the US state of Maryland. ... Mr. ... Regional definitions vary from source to source. ...

Complete list of area number groups from the Social Security Administration
  • The middle two digits are the group number. They have no special geographic or data significance but merely serve to break the number into conveniently sized blocks for orderly issuance.
  • There is a theory that the two middle digits can be used to identify a person's ethnic background. African Americans, Asians and people of color will almost always have an odd middle number, while Caucasians will have an even number. This is debunked as an urban legend on snopes.com.

The group numbers range from 01 to 99. However, they are not assigned in consecutive order. For administrative reasons, group numbers are issued in the following order: Urban legends are a kind of folklore consisting of stories often thought to be factual by those circulating them (see rumor). ...

  1. ODD numbers from 01 through 09
  2. EVEN numbers from 10 through 98
  3. EVEN numbers from 02 through 08
  4. ODD numbers from 11 through 99

As an example, group number 98 will be issued before 11.

  • The last four digits are serial numbers. They represent a straight numerical sequence of digits from 0001-9999 within the group.

A serial number is a unique number that is one of a series assigned for identification which varies from its successor or predecessor by a fixed discrete integer value. ...

Valid SSNs

Currently, a valid SSN cannot have the first three digits (the area number) above 772, the highest area number which the Social Security Administration has allocated.


There are also special numbers which will never be allocated:

  • Numbers with all zeros in a digit group (000-xx-xxxx, xxx-00-xxxx, xxx-xx-0000).
  • Numbers of the form 666-xx-xxxx, probably due to the potential controversy (see Number of the Beast). Though the omission of this area number is not acknowledged by the SSA, it remains unassigned.
  • Numbers from 987-65-4320 to 987-65-4329 are reserved for advertising use.

Finally, the Administration publishes the highest group number used for each area number. Since these are allocated in a regular (if unusual) pattern, it may be possible to identify an invalid SSN by accidental inclusion of an invalid group number. Despite these measures, fraudulent non-existent SSNs are possible, because of the lack of a check digit. The Number of the Beast is mentioned in the Book of Revelation of the Christian New Testament and has long been accepted to be 666. ... A check digit is a form of redundancy check used for error detection, the decimal equivalent of a binary checksum. ...


SSNs invalidated by use in advertising

The promotional Social Security card as distributed by the F.W. Woolworth Company
The promotional Social Security card as distributed by the F.W. Woolworth Company

SSNs used in advertising have rendered those numbers invalid. One famous instance of this occurred in 1938 when the E. H. Ferree Company in Lockport, New York decided to promote its product by showing how a Social Security card would fit into its wallets. A sample card, used for display purposes, was placed in each wallet, which was sold by Woolworth and other department stores across the country. The wallet manufacturer's vice president thought it would be clever to use the actual SSN of his secretary, Hilda Whitcher. Image File history File links Walletssn2. ... Image File history File links Walletssn2. ... Sample United States Social Security Card In the United States, a Social Security number (or SSN) is a number issued to citizens, permanent residents, and temporary (working) residents under section 205(c)(2) of the Social Security Act, codified as . ... Foot Locker Inc NYSE: FL (formerly Z) is a United States company specialising in athletic footwear and clothing. ... Lockport, New York refers to both a city and a town in Niagara County, New York, near Niagara Falls and Buffalo. ... A wallet is a small (usually pocket-sized) storage device. ... Foot Locker Inc NYSE: FL (formerly Z) is a United States company specialising in athletic footwear and clothing. ...


Even though the card was printed in red (the real card is printed in blue), was half the size of the real card, and had "Specimen" printed across the front, many people used the SSN. Over time the number that appeared (078-05-1120) was claimed by over 40,000 people as their own. The SSA initiated an advertising campaign stating that it was incorrect to use the number. (Hilda Whitcher was issued a new SSN.) However, the number was found to be in use by 12 individuals as late as 1977.


See also

A national identification number is used by the governments of many countries as a means of tracking their citizens, permanent residents, and temporary residents for the purposes of work, taxation, government benefits, health care, and other governmentally-related functions. ...

External links


  Results from FactBites:
 
Social Security (United States) (1178 words)
Social Security was created during the administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in 1935.
Often the reaction to any talk of Social Security reforms or phaseouts by the bloc of elderly voters, many of whom did not, or could not, save for their own retirement, is to assume or talk about the reform as though it will result in the cutoff of payouts.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, there were several proposals to reform Social Security by converting it from a pay-as-we-go system (compared by its critics to the illegal Ponzi pyramid scheme) into one in which workers would have accounts which could include securities such as stocks, certificates of deposit, and mutual funds.
Applying for a Social Security Number - Social Security Number Process - New Social Security Number (977 words)
Additionally, a U.S. resident may apply for a social security number for a nonresident dependent when the number is necessary for U.S. tax purposes or some other valid reason, the evidence requirements of ß422.107 are met, and we determine that a personal interview with the dependent is not required.
When a person who is not a U.S. citizen applies for an original social security number or a duplicate or corrected social security number card, she or he is required to submit, as evidence of alien status, a current document issued by the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services in accordance with that agency’s regulations.
The document must show that the applicant has been lawfully admitted to the United States, either for permanent residence or under authority of law permitting him or her to work in the United States, or that the applicant’s alien status has changed so that it is lawful for him or her to work.
  More results at FactBites »


 
 

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