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Historical December 1983 report or notice. Original dates, prices and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
SSA’s Free Services Social Security provides many valuable services free of charge at each of its 1,340 nation-wide offices.
The value of these free services has become more apparent as private businesses have been set up in urban areas to “help” people with Social Security related matters for a fee.
This practice is not illegal, but it serves no purpose because the Social Security Administration will help people free of charge. Typically, a fee of $10 or $20 is charged to assist a new bride to change her name or for a worker to obtain earnings information.
Each process requires the completion of a single form which is free at any Social Security office and is widely distributed in this area.
A change of name applicant must provide proof of identity and a marriage license or other document which established the name change such as a divorce or adoption decree.
The person must provide these documents whether or not he has paid a fee to a private business for their assistance, or has gone directly to Social Security and received the same service at no charge.
The Social Security Administration is the best source of information about all aspects of the Social Security program.
No other business can call on five decades of experience, eighty thousand skilled employees, or one of the world’s largest computer systems to assist you in handling your Social Security business.
The Social Security offices have free pamphlets with the most up to date information about Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, and Medicare that are available anywhere. Speakers and films are also available for groups at no charge to the group. People Aware of “Notch” Many people in the St. Louis area who are approaching retirement have recently become aware of the “notch” problem.
The so-called notch came about because of the 1977 Social Security amendments. [Text clipped at the bottom of the supplied scan; the next column resumes below.] who reached 65 in 1982 (born in 1917) can receive lower Social Security benefits than a comparable person who reached 65 in 1981 (born in 1918) even though both persons had identical lifetime earnings. Under the law prior to the 1977 amendments, benefits were overadjusted for inflation.
For many workers retiring in the future, benefits could have been as much as 50 percent more than their earnings before retirement. Social Security would have needed considerable additional financing to pay these benefits.
The 1977 amendments removed this overadjustment for inflation by providing a new method to figure benefits for all workers born after 1916. Workers born in 1916 or earlier, however, continue to get benefits for those people who work to older ages.
In addition to changing the method of figuring benefits, Congress intentionally set benefit levels slightly lower than those prevailing under pre-1977 law to eliminate the unintended rise that had taken place since the early 1970s.
This decision caused an immediate difference in benefits figured under the new method compared to those figured under the old method. Further, the unforeseen high inflation that took place after 1977 caused the difference between the old-law and new-law benefits to be larger than expected.
To ease the transition from the old to the new benefit formula, the 1977 amendments included a special method of figuring benefits for people nearing 62 — those born in 1917-1921. Benefits for these people are figured under the new law and under the transitional provision.
They are paid the higher of these two benefits. Benefits for this group of people are somewhat greater than they would have been under the new formula without these special rules. People born in 1922 and later will have their benefits figured only under the new benefit methods. Therefore, people born after 1916 are not being penalized by receiving benefits which are unjustly low. Rather, people born in 1916 or earlier who work past age 62 are getting benefits that are higher than originally intended by Congress.
[Beginning of the following sentence is clipped in the supplied scan.] jects discussed above can be obtained at the Central West End Social Security Office, located at 625 N. Euclid, Suite 601, St. Louis, Mo.
The telephone number
[The final telephone-number line is clipped in the supplied scan.]
Originally published in The Paper, December 1983.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Archival transcription note: The Notch discussion loses wording at the bottom of the left column; an explicit marker replaces the unreadable span. The final office-contact sentence is clipped. The source gives a birth year of 1918 for someone reaching 65 in 1981; that arithmetic inconsistency is retained. Historical benefit explanations are not current guidance.
Original source: SD_Times1983_12.pdf, printed page(s) 11; PDF page(s) 11.
