Social Security is once again sending out clearly false benefit statements. If the code generating the statements is generating actual benefit payments, millions of Americans may be receiving too little or too much in Social Security benefit payments. If you are receiving too much, you can expect to be billed for all past overpayments years later even though the mistaken overpayment was entirely Social Security's fault.
Back in June of 2019, I wrote about Social Security mailing out or electronically producing benefit estimates that were completely screwy. This was not the two standard reasons underlying false benefit statements — first, for those under 60, that Social Security ridiculously assumes neither future inflation nor future economy-wide wage growth, and second, for those over 60 and still working, that Social Security makes arbitrary assumptions about retirement dates and earnings through retirement. No, the standard reasons to question these statements weren't at play. Instead, Social Security's statements stipulated benefit amounts that violated its own benefit rules.
I never learned what bug in the system's code led to its nutty statements or how many people were receiving or downloading hugely incorrect benefit estimates. But higher-ups at Social Security assured me they had found and fixed the problem. So I was surprised to receive the following email from a MaxiFi Planner user (MaxiFi Planner is my company's software tool) named David.
Dear Larry, I am...
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