Low-income aged: eligibility ad participation in SSI

This article reports on a study undertaken to evaluate the Social Security Administration's (SSA) methods for estimating the number of persons eligible for Federal Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments. SSA estimates that 65-70 percent of the aged eligible for SSI actually participate in the program. It has been argued that the actual participation rate may be either higher or lower than SSA estimates because SSA misestimates the size of the eligible population. SSA bases its estimates of the number of persons eligible on data in the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey (CPS). In this study, a sample of 2,000 low-income aged persons was interviewed in 1979, and two sets of information were collected: One duplicated the data used by SSA to make its estimates; the other duplicated the type of information collected when a person actually applies for SSI. When the two sets were compared, it was found that the methodology that SSA uses to estimate the size of the eligible population and the information collected from SSI applicants produced estimates that were quite similar. The study also evaluated theories to explain why some persons eligible for SSI do not claim benefits. The study found that the elderly are more likely to participate in SSI if they live in States that supplement Federal SSI payments and that do not have a history of imposing liens on the property of welfare recipients. Participants also tend to have somewhat lower incomes (excluding SSI) than nonparticipants. No evidence was found that variations in practices among Social Security district offices could account for differences in SSI participation rates.