Social Security Administration (SSA)

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Social Security Short Paper History of Social Security According to Social Security (n.d.), the Social Security Administration (SSA) began life as the Social Security Board (SSB). The SSB was created at the moment President Roosevelt inked his signature on the Social Security Act (August 14, 1935 at 3:30 p.m.). The SSB was an entirely new entity, with no staff, no facilities and no budget. The initial personnel were donated from existing agencies, and a temporary budget was obtained from Harry Hopkins and the Federal Emergency Relief Administration. Frances Perkins, Secretary of Labor, offered one of her Assistant Secretaries, Arthur Altmeyer, to be an initial Board member, and she even gave her high-backed red-leather executive chair to Altmeyer …show more content…

Current Structure of Social Security According to the Social Security Organizational Structure (n.d.), the SSA is headed by a Commissioner and has a staff of almost 60,000 employees. SSA 's central office is located in Baltimore, Maryland. The field organization, which is decentralized to provide services at the local level, includes 10 regional offices, 6 processing centers, and approximately 1,230 field offices. There are 2 additional processing centers in central office (“Organizational Structure”, n.d.). Calculation of …show more content…

Many people wonder how we figure their Social Security retirement benefit. Social Security benefits are based on your lifetime earnings. SSA adjusts or “index” your actual earnings to account for changes in average wages since the year the earnings were received. Social Security then calculates your average indexed monthly earnings during the 35 years in which you earned the most and then applies a formula to these earnings and arrive at your basic benefit, or “primary insurance amount.” This is how much you would receive at your full retirement age—65 or older, depending on your date of birth (“Your Retirement Benefit: How It’s Figured”, n.d.). Social Security (n.d.) now has a calculator that lets you estimate your retirement benefit by accessing your actual earnings record through a secure interface. If you are estimating a normal retirement benefit, then you may want to try using the Retirement Estimator first, because it is easier to use than the Detailed Calculator and does not require you to enter your earnings record (“Retirement Estimator”,