This is going to be a column about the infamous “notch babies.” I thought this issue had died, because frankly, almost everyone affected by this glitch in Social Security law has died. (The few still alive would be over 100 years old.) But amazingly, I am now hearing from the babies of notch babies! In other words, people now in their 70s are writing to me about an issue that affected their parents. Here is a typical example.
“I’ve always been curious about something. My mom, who would have turned 100 today if she were still alive, always complained that she was being cheated out of Social Security benefits because of something called ‘the notch.’ In fact, she called herself a “notch baby.” I know it’s too late to do anything about it, but can you explain what that was all about?”
Yes, I can explain. This cohort of now mostly deceased Social Security beneficiaries are generally people born between 1917 and about 1926. Their false claims about getting financially fleeced by Uncle Sam were fueled by a rather sophisticated, albeit deceitful and shameful lobbying campaign, sponsored by greedy gadflies out to make a quick buck.
The infamous “notch” refers to a time period when corrections were made to the Social Security benefit formula — corrections that were necessary to ensure that all Social Security recipients were paid properly, but corrections that were misconstrued by many to be a way of cheating them out of benefits they felt they were due. Here’s the story.
In 1972,...
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