Social Security Administration
Established: August 14, 1935
Mission: To deliver social security services that meet the changing needs of the public.
Reason for creation: The Social Security Administration (SSA) was created to help elderly Americans meet basic living expenses as their earning power declined with age and to provide unemployment insurance to the unemployed.
The Great Depression plunged the country into a period of economic turmoil and, in doing so, revealed many of the vulnerabilities the industrial revolution had created. Millions of Americans became unemployed and were unable to procure even basic necessities, and elderly citizens were especially impacted. By the 1930s, most other industrialized nations had some form of public social security program and public outcry for an American public pension system began to grow. Throughout the first several years of the Great Depression, various programs were proposed and debated without any becoming law.
Ultimately, President Franklin D. Roosevelt proposed a program based on European systems of economic security in which workers contributed a portion of their income to fund the pensions of retired citizens. FDR formed the Committee on Economic Security (CES) to draft such a program. The CES’s proposed program included a pension for the elderly, unemployment benefits, health insurance for those with financial need, benefits for widows with children, and assistance for disabled citizens. After extensive congressional debate the legislation which ultimately reached FDR’s desk, the Social Security Act of 1935, only included federal benefits programs for retirees and the unemployed – but did include money for states to help some of the other groups mentioned in the CES’s proposal. The act established the Social Security Board to manage and run the programs.
In 1946, the Social Security Board was renamed the Social Security Administration.
Impacts: Since its first implementation, the Social Security program has expanded in order to provide more benefits to more citizens. In 1956, a disability program was added to help those unable to work due to a disability. Medicare, a Social Security healthcare program, was established in 1965. In 1975, automatic cost of living adjustments were instituted for benefit payments.
Today, the majority of American retirees rely on Social Security as a major source of income. It is particularly important for low-income retirees. In addition to senior citizens, the program also lifts more than 1 million children out of poverty. It remains one of the Federal Government’s most popular programs with 74% of Americans opposing cuts to benefits.
