Unlawful Work Leads to Tripling of "Earning Suspense File" Over Past Decade, Says New Social Security Administration Data
WASHINGTON, July 27 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The "Earnings Suspense File" (ESF), used by the Social Security Administration (SSA) to track names and Social Security numbers that do not match government records, has tripled over the past decade. The chief cause of growth in the file is unauthorized work by non-citizens, according to SSA Inspector General Patrick P. O'Carroll.
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Under an immigration amnesty plan, millions of today's illegal workers would be eligible for hundreds of billions in Social Security dollars, as evidenced by the dramatic growth of the Earnings Suspense File.
The new data were obtained through an information request by The Senior Citizens League (TSCL), and represent the first time updated information about the ESF has been publicly released and analyzed since TSCL's original report in 2007. The analysis reveals that:
- From 2000-2007 (the most recent years for which data is available), the file grew by an average of $67 billion per year in "uncredited wages," represented by 9.8 million wage reports per year. That is more than three times faster than the $18.9 billion and 5.2 million wage reports the file grew each year during the 1990s.
- In just the three years since TSCL's last report in 2007, the Earnings Suspense File has jumped 43 percent, from $585 billion to $835 billion.
- From 1937-1999 (a 63-year period), the ESF accumulated a total of $301.8 billion; from 2000-2007, it grew to $835 billion. When data from 2008 and 2009 becomes available, TSCL projects that the file will have tripled over just the past decade.
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