Today's Feature Article • Published Monday, July 30, 2001


Can I Quit Social Security And Get My Money Back?

-- by Gordon Phillips, Founder & CIO: INFORM AMERICA!

This commonly asked question, although superficially reasonable, belies a fundamental misunderstanding of the situation. 

The answer is: Yes (sort of), and, No.

There is no legal provision within the Social Security Act to "quit", however the very term "quit" is a misnomer. Participation in Social Security is strictly voluntary (elective, consensual), hence, in order to "quit", de facto, one simply stops participating.

An individual can elect to participate one quarter (of a year) and not the next, then participate again the following quarter but not the next, and so forth.

The Social Security Administration says: "The Social Security Act does not require an individual [citizen] to have a Social Security Number (SSN) to live and work within the United States, nor does it require a SSN simply for the purpose of having one."

Title 42 "Health, Education And Welfare" of the United States Code, in Chapter 7, at 405(c)(2)(B)(i) titled "Evidence, procedure, and certification for payments", states in excerpted part:

"... the Secretary [of Social Security] shall take affirmative measures to assure that social security account numbers will, to the maximum extent practicable, be assigned to all members of appropriate groups or categories of individuals by assigning such numbers (or ascertaining that such numbers have already been assigned): 

(I) to aliens at the time of their lawful admission to the United States either for permanent residence or under other authority of law permitting them to engage in employment in the United States and to other aliens at such time as their status is so changed as to make it lawful for them to engage in such employment; 

(II) to any individual who is an applicant for or recipient of benefits under any program financed in whole or in part from Federal funds including any child on whose behalf such benefits are claimed by another person;"

Aliens are numbered automatically upon entering the country; "applicant[s] for or recipient of benefits" must, you guessed it, apply. And, of course, all applications can only be voluntary.

As for obtaining a refund, no tax is refundable. If it were, it would be a donation and not a tax. Social Security is not a donation, tithing or other contribution. It is a tax. For this reason you cannot "get all your social security money back".

Those wishing to longer participate would be wise to remember the adage that, at any moment, life always consists of two phases: 1) up until now, and; 2) from now on.

All tax monies paid into social security are gone forever, never to be seen again. In the future, one may decide to make arrangements to take care of his own retirement as I and thousands of others are doing.

Payments made this week to current social security benefits recipients ("retirees") are made from taxes collected from last week's participants. In other words, those exiting at the "top" of the pyramid are being funded in present time by those entering at the "bottom" - the very essence of a classic ponzi scheme.

In 1999, the Social Security Administration had a link on their web site stating: "Why Social Security Is Not A Ponzi Scheme". Apparently the waves of chuckling e-mails from visitors to that link caused officials to hastily remove it, no doubt never to return.

When first enacted in 1935, approximately 50 workers paid in to Social Security for each worker retiring. Today, the ratio is 3.2:1 and 2 are flipping hamburgers at minimum wage.

The Social Security Act was enacted as a U.S. government sponsored, voluntary pension program for the benefit of individuals who wish to participate in the program. The Act is administered by the Social Security Administration which handles the administration and payment of benefits under the provisions of the law.

Congress made its first attempt at socialist (Marxist) wealth redistribution when it passed legislation in 1934 to provide for the retirement of railroad workers. Since the workers traveled across state lines on the railroads, Congress argued that the Act came under the interstate commerce clause.

Seeing through this transparent ruse, the supreme Court shot the Act down as
unconstitutional in its decision in Railroad Retirement Board v. Alton Railroad Company decided May 6, 1935, stating:

"The catalog of means and actions which might be imposed upon an employer in any business, tending to the comfort and satisfaction of his employees, seems endless. Provisions for free medical attendance and nursing, for clothing, for food, for housing, for the education of children, and a hundred other matters might with equal propriety be proposed as tending to relieve the employee of mental strain and worry. Can it fairly be said that the power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce extends to the prescription of any or all of these things? Is it not apparent that they are really and essentially related solely to the social welfare of the worker, and therefore remote from any regulation of commerce as such? We think the answer is plain. These matters obviously lie outside the orbit of Congressional power."

Translation: the high court informed Congress that it has no constitutional authority whatsoever to legislate for "the social welfare of the worker." None.

To sidestep this constitutional speed bump on the six-lane highway to one-world government, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, a man whose name will one day live in infamy, had the Social Security Act passed as a treaty.

Contrary to popular misunderstanding, treaties do not apply to the citizen when residing within his own country, but when residing as an alien in the country with which the treaty is enacted. Otherwise, any foreign legislature, say that of France, could pass a law to dictate the legal requirements of a citizen sitting at his kitchen table in, say, Kansas.
Obviously, such a contention would be ludicrous on its face.

Many are unaware that the federal government mails many thousands of social security checks each month to foreigners all over the world, each of whom worked as a resident in the U.S. long enough to become vested for retirement benefits. 

Forty (40) quarters of voluntary participation are usually required before application for benefits can be made, however benefits are never paid automatically. An application must first be made; you must first ask permission to receive your benefits.

The Social Security Administration mails out approximately 47,000,000 retirement, disability, unemployment and Medicare checks each month (give or take a few million) from its offices along Security Boulevard in Baltimore, Maryland. Acres of SSA buildings, block after block, stretch back from the road as far as the eye can see, lights blazing in the windows on all floors all night long.

It is truly the largest wealth redistribution factory in the history of the human race. Millions who would otherwise have conducted their affairs so as to be independent by old age or living with their children as God intended now depend for their very subsistence upon this monthly outpouring of congressional largesse, the result of which is an outpouring of votes for those politicians who promise to keep the spigot wide open.

The tax upon which "old age benefits" are based is collected by the Internal Revenue Service under the provisions of Title 26 of the United States Code, otherwise known as the Internal Revenue Code.

Monies collected by the IRS are not forwarded directly to the Social Security Administration to fund its administrative and disbursement activities as most believe, but rather end up in the general fund along with all other taxes collected.

All taxes of whatever type ever collected to this date by the IRS (which is charged with the duty of collecting all internal revenue) - including social security taxes - have already long since been spent by Congress to (among other purposes too numerous to mention):

* Prop up the buying power of the paper Federal Reserve Note (which some erroneously refer to as a "dollar");

* Fund studies of the sex life of the tse tse fly;

* Bail out failed Savings & Loans;

* Build palatial offices for federal judges, and;

* Rescue the economies of a host of other countries including Mexico, Russia, Malaysia, Brazil (not to mention dozens of others), none of which loans will ever be repaid.

Since the days of the Eisenhower administration, Congress has spent far more money than it takes in, hence the currently $6 trillion deficit. Since 1940, the Social Security Administration has mailed out $6 trillion more in benefits than it has taken in as taxes. Could this be a mere coincidence?

The public is led to believe that social security taxes are held in a "Social Security Trust Fund". In reality, no such fund exists, except on paper as an accounting gimmick only.

Each year, Congress dips into the so-called "trust fund" to "balance" the government's books, leaving behind nothing but non-negotiable government bonds, or "I.O.U.'s", promising to pay money to itself.

Nowhere in the Constitution can you find the authority for the government to be in the insurance business in the first place, wherefore the very title "Social Security Trust Fund" when viewed in its proper light can be seen for what it really is: blatantly disingenuous propaganda.

As I write on page 101 of my book, "Losing Your Illusions": "On December 13, 1993, investment banker and chairman of the one-world prompting Council on Foreign Relations, Peter G. Peterson, stated at an Entitlements Conference held at Bryn Mawr College: 'The federal government has borrowed over $7 trillion from the social security trust fund.'"

That was in 1993. It's now 1999.

Also on page 101 of "Losing Your Illusion", I go on to state in excerpted part: "In an article in the October 9th, 1995 issue of Forbes Magazine titled The Legal Ponzi Scheme, Karl Borden, professor of financial economics at the University of Nebraska, wrote: 'Social Security is the classic playout of a Ponzi pyramid scheme. It's a sucker bet for most of the population. There are only a few things you can do at this stage. One is to look for new suckers.' Economist William Shipman, who co-chaired a study project on the privatization of Social Security stated: 'Social Security has been a horrifically bad investment for Americans.' Dorcas Hardy, the Social Security Commissioner under President Regan who wrote a book called "Social Insecurity", denouncing this scam, was quoted in the December 1995 Reader's Digest as saying: 'There is no prospect that today's younger workers will receive all the Social Security and Medicare benefits currently promised them.'"

Ultimately, the money to repay all of these non-negotiable bonds can be raised only by a politically sensitive combination of A) reducing social security, Medicare and all other welfare entitlement benefits through so-called "means testing"; B) through a dramatic raise in the employment tax rate, or; C) both. "C" is the correct answer.

Most Americans will never see a dime of their social security tax contributions when it's their turn to collect. Write your Representative in Congress and ask for a free copy of "The Financial Outlook for Social Security and Medicare", published by the Congressional Research Service as report number 92-608, dated July 31, 1992. It uses the word "insolvency" at least ten times.

Social security is not a contract as some have theorized, but a political promise to be kept at the whim of the legislature. Monies disbursed by the Social Security Administration must be appropriated by Congress each year as needed. Since no contractual obligation exists for the payment of any benefits, the benefits could be terminated at any time if Congress did not appropriate the funds.

Stated more bluntly, Congress could renege on its promise simply by passing a majority vote to cancel all benefits. This vote could be held at 10:00AM tomorrow morning.

Due to the aggressive lobbying efforts of the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) whose members can be relied upon to defend the "the dole" with their last ounce of strength, Congress has kept the benefits spigot wide open so far, while quietly instructing the print media to begin reconditioning the public mind set to no longer depend upon Uncle Sam.

A fact unknown to most Americans is that no individual "account" actually exists with the Social Security Administration (SSA). All such "accounts" are in reality mere bookkeeping entries of accrued benefits due to be paid out under a given Social Security Number (SSN).

Interestingly, the name associated with the individual to whom a SSN has been assigned is moot and of no importance. A legal name change would have no bearing on the benefits accrued as a result of contributions made under a given SSN.

The "number" itself is everything, as was intended from the outset. The emerging socialist world order cannot come to full fruition without the citizens of the various nations being enumerated by their respective governments.

Government surveillance and control of its populace would otherwise be impossible when so many units share the exact same name (Bob Smith, Juan Perez, Pierre Dupres, etc.) Who can tell them apart? Once numbered, however, all confusion ends and tracking becomes a matter of mere administrative procedure.

Seen in its proper light, social security is a sovereignty transfer system under which rights to property are waived and converted into an expectation of benefits - i.e., government largesse - to be doled out at the pleasure of the legislature.

A citizen has no standing in court to sue the government for his "retirement check" since a beneficiary has no legal standing against his benefactor. 

Remember, as we always say: "If you want to BE free, you have to LIVE free!".

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LEGAL DISCLAIMER: The preceding article contains facts on the public record which can be consulted at any law library. It is not intended to be construed as legal or tax advice. If you find yourself in need of such advice, please seek the services of a competent, licensed tax professional -- assuming, of course, that one can be located.