You Must Pay In to Get Something Out

Children and widows may not have paid into Social Security, but they have the right to receive Social Security from their deceased family member.

If widows and children were denied benefits from a deceased father, what would they do? fizkes/Shutterstock

More than a few people are just bound and determined to believe the worst about the government in general and about the Social Security system in particular.

Here is one example of that. In my recent survey of the services provided by the Social Security Administration, hundreds of my readers praised the agency and gave it an average rating of 4.5 stars (out of 5). But borrowing a phrase from former Vice President Spiro Agnew, more than a few “nattering nabobs of negativism” also piped up with comments similar to this one: “We all know the government can’t do anything right. And the SSA gets one star because it can’t do anything right, either.” Another person said this: “I give the SSA one star. Even though I’ve never been to a Social Security office, I can only imagine it’s 10 times worse than your typical driver’s license bureau!”