You Can Create A My Social Security Account To: Fill & Download for Free

TL; DR: Social Security offers overseas direct deposit for beneficiaries. There is no need to travel to the US to apply for or pick up benefits.More information can be found by reading the SSA booklet on payments outside the US, found here: https://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10137.pdf (https://www.ssa.gov/pubs/EN-05-10137.pdf)However, if you're one of the many Indian citizens working in the US on H-1B, you may wish to read further for additional information and my answer may dispel many myths you may have heard about foreign workers and Social Security retirement benefits.Provided one is fully qualified by having 40 quarters of coverage (generally 10 years of work), they can draw a retirement benefit. In the past, foreign workers who chose not to pursue LPR status didn’t remain in the US long enough to earn 40 SSA work quarters. However, with the American Competitiveness in the 21st Century Act, this has changed, primarily for India-born workers who cannot get LPR status in a timely manner because of the diversity cap in Sec 202(a)(2) of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Those workers with an approved I-140 petition can remain in H-1B status indefinitely. These same workers are going to be the ones who are most likely to work long enough to qualify for a retirement benefit while at the same time not being LPRs or citizens of the US.How does the quarter of coverage system work? Below is a table showing the amount of Social Security taxable income that one must earn in a given year to get one quarter of coverage:A maximum of four quarters can be earned in a given year. For 2020, once one has earned $5,640, they have earned their four quarters for the year. For a person earning six figures, they’ll earn this by the end of January. The amount a quarter is worth may not seem like much, but when one looks at a person earning the federal minimum wage working 40 hours per week, it will take them five months (20 weeks) of full time work to earn four quarters. The best way to determine SSA taxed earnings is by looking at one’s W-2:Box 3 will show the wages that were taxed for Social Security. So long as this amount is over the value for four work quarters, one has earned all their quarters for that year.The tax deduction on one’s paycheck can have many names. It can be ‘Social Security’, however other acronyms used are OASDI, FICA (the law that mandates payroll taxes for Social Security contributions and Medicare) and SSDI (which refers to the disability benefit only.) Depending on how an employer chooses to list deductions, they may be broken out into the 6.2% Social Security amount and the 1.45% Medicare amount or they may be lumped together at 7.65% of income subject to these taxes. Both the employer and the employee contribute an equal amount. Self employed persons who are sole proprietors (Schedule C) will pay both portions or 15.3%; this is commonly called the self-employment tax, but it is the same tax employees pay, just twice as much to account for the fact the the self employed person is also their own employer.Do not confuse Social Security retirement and disability benefits with the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program, which is also administered by the Social Security Administration. It is a separate welfare program for US citizens and certain LPRs. It cannot be paid to beneficiaries who live outside the US. SSI is means tested and for the disabled and elderly who are very poor and have no or little other income and resources of their own.Another confusion is company retirement plans like 401(k)s. These plans are private. Every plan is different and rules vary. Normally contributions to these plans are refunded to the contributor if they have not become vested by contributing for the required minimum period of time. If one is forced to cash out a 401(k), they need to see a financial planner or accountant if they are not aware of the pitfalls of cashing out a 401(k) before one is 59 1/2 and/or taking the money out all at one. Read one’s 401(k) literature carefully.Edit: There is a lot of disinformation out there. If one wants to comment that my answer is incorrect or a reply to a comment is incorrect, they must post links to original research, not links to discussion groups or hearsay anecdotal evidence, news articles, etc. I will not allow the comments to this answer to be used to spread disinformation.I am open to learning new information or a correction from what my own original research has found, but such information must be substantiated. Any contrary comments without valid citations will be deleted. You have been warned - my answer, my rules.Currently, according to the Social Security Administration, there is exists no treaty, or totalization agreement, between the US and India regarding social security benefits or contributions. U.S. International Social Security AgreementsA person must contribute to Social Security and earn 40 work quarters (10 years) to be insured for a retirement benefit. Generally, H-1B status can last a maximum of six years. However, the AC-21 Act allows H-1B status to be extended indefinitely, thus it is possible for certain H-1B workers to meet the 40 quarter requirement. AC21 generally benefits those foreign workers with an approved I-140 petition but who cannot apply permanent residence yet due to the artificial backlog created by INA Sec. 202(a)(2). Those affected are mostly India-born.Please do not contribute to the disinformation that already exists. Do original research on the law for yourself, do not rely on the Internet or even my own answer. Every person’s case is unique; what applies to one may not apply to all.Edit #2: Please do not confuse the Supplemental Security Income program (SSI) with Social Security retirement benefits, referred to by many acronyms such as SSDI and OASDI. FICA is the law that mandates payroll deduction of the taxes for OASDI and Medicare. These are separate programs. SSI is a welfare benefit available only to US citizens and in limited circumstances, LPRs. SSI is means tested and is designed for those with no income or resources who cannot work for medical reasons or have reached retirement age. This is not the program I'm talking about.Edit #3: Moved some information in the prior edits into the main answer and reorganized the answer for easier reading. 25K plus views! I hope all those who have read are much better informed about Social Security than they were.Edit #4: Added information about how SSA work quarters are earned. This answer is getting really long, however I’m adding information based on questions raised in the comments. I’ve also done more revising and reorganization to shorten the answer.Edit #5: Added information that 401(k) plans and other company offered retirement savings plans are private and have nothing to do with Social Security.

Computers, man!So, sometimes I need to go to a classified meeting at another company. I have a clearance but, unlike the movies, that doesn’t come with a cool ID with me looking all Fox Mulder and “SECRET” in big red letters. Kind of a shame.Rather, there’s a computer system that establishes credentials between our company and their company for that one visit. Even if someone else intercepted that credential, it’s no good for getting anyone but me into any other meeting.That’s what they really ought to have. I’m going to use Public Key Encryption for this, as it’s a system that works both to provide security and authentication. In such a system, a key generator makes two cryptographic keys: one public, one private. If I send you a message encrypted with your public key, only your private key can decrypt it — the message is secure. If I send you a message encrypted with my private key, only my public key can decrypt it — proof that it’s me sending the message. If I do both, you know I sent the message, and only you can read the message (read more here: Public-key cryptography).It would work something like this. Let’s call it SSSID, and imagine it’s managed by the Social Security Administration or some other trusted organization. Let’s say I want to apply for a loan, and that bank needs my social security number (ignore for the moment that it’s not really a proper use of my social security number). So here’s what happens:The bank makes a request for my SSSID, my digital replacement for a Social Security Number (SSN). Only pre-approved agencies can make this request. The SSSID system already has their public key in their database, and this request is authenticated.I get a notification via the SSSID app on my phone or other computer, “Dogfish Head Bank of Delaware” made a request for my SSSID. I can approve or disapprove the request. I imagine this app would allow me to designate trusted organizations, but without my premission, no one gets my ID without my approval.When I approve it, the SSSID folks make up a custom internal ID code. My real ID isn’t a Social Security number anymore, but a 256-bit or 1024-bit cryptographic code. That code is never handed out, but it’s hashed with a similar code that was generated when this bank’s account with SSSID was made. The hashed token produced with my internal code and the bank’s is always the same, so they get a consistent ID for me, but no one else will ever get the same ID. That ID only associates me and the bank when used by the bank… no one else can use it or trace it back to me.This token is catenated with a random salt number and encrypted with the bank’s public key and a SSSID-organization private key. So the code that’s sent back to the bank is different every time, and looks like random nonsense to the outside world.When the bank gets this public token, they have crytographic proof that the token came from SSSID, as it will decrypt by applying the SSSID organization’s public key, then the bank’s own private key. So only they ever see it, and its no good to anyone else anyway.Or something like that. You have authentication in both directions, mandatory user approval of ID transfers, and IDs that can’t be tracked by public observers even if they’re hacking the banking system. And ultimately, no matter how hacked a bank gets, the IDs they have for me are only ever usable by that bank.So ok, this now creates a big problem with a zillion years of SSNs being used for ID, right? My bank stores my 9-digit SSN, not the relatively gigantic encrypted ID they get from SSSID, right? Well, yes… but also a no-brainer. If they bank doesn’t want to change their internal system, they add on a database of SSSIDs, and use the index into that database as each customer’s personal ID in their system. That ID database puts another level of obsfucation between me and the bad-guy, and it’s a trivial thing a database programmer could write in an afternoon.So take the big Equifax hack we just learned about… lets assume a hacker had grabbed all of this information with SSSID codes instead. First of all, those codes would only be of value to Equifax. As soon as they discovered the hack, Equifax could ping the SSSID server and invalidate their keys. None of those stolen tokens would now be useful in any way at all. They would be issued new public and private keys and a new internal root ID code.And while it should be obvious by this point, I’ll say it anyway… this saves me from myself. Under this system, I don’t know my SSN, because there’s no way I could memorize a 256-bit security code, much less a 1024-bit or better security code. So that prevents me — and every other fool — from handing over their SSN to people and companies who have no legit use for it.And think think about this system for a minute… I started this, intentionally, to be about one’s social security number, because that was asked in the question. But in truth, this proposed SSSID code would only be a social security code when the actual Social Security Administration was the vetted agency requesting my ID. No other vetted agency would have a key that has any possible connection to my social security account. So this is actually way more valid as universal proof-of-identity, since that ID is absolutely verified AND only good to the agency making the request.So ok, that’s my 10-minute solution. There absolutely could be a hole in there somewhere, but it’s already vastly superior to the out-in-the-open information that we use today. The fact that we haven’t gone to such a system ages ago is insane.

Being poor is not determined by education, mental health, some status of “deserving it” or what have you.I am a top writer on Quora a couple years running now, and I live under the poverty line.I was rear ended by a drunk driver some years back. The subsequent series of health crises drained my bank accounts, savings and 401K, because that’s how our health system is designed.It was only after my assets were reduced under $2000 that I was eligible for public health benefits. I will never be allowed to have over $2000 in assets again, so it’s highly unlikely I will ever escape poverty. I was at one point the VP of Marketing and Business Development of the 3rd fastest growing private company in Oregon, listed on a couple Inc. indices. I was, at the time of the accident, the founding executive director of The Tor Project.My then boyfriend — who was scrambling to keep me, my elderly mom with Parkinson’s and Lewy body dementia, and my teenage son afloat, with me as primary breadwinner out of commission — didn’t know to look at Quicken to see how much of the bank account was sequestered to pay taxes when I got taken out on April Fool’s Day. So I will never be able to pay off my tax debt, and never be able to have a bank account again.Living in this country without a bank account is hell.I have all kinds of illness and mobility disabilities, and live in subsidized elder/disability housing. But these people don’t take the stored value card I get my social security on, as payment for rent.So I have to physically get myself to the post office, and pay to have a money order cut and mailed to them. When I am too ill to get myself there by the 5th, I can pay an extra $50 in rent on my tiny studio apartment. That’s a 20% surcharge on my rent, because I’m ill. And I’m in this place, because I’m ill. I’ve asked my social worker if I can get assistance with this, and I’ve been told that I can not unless I sign all of my financial affairs over to a representative of the State. I frankly feel uncomfortable with that.I can still write, but not consistently enough for people to pay me. I have a Patreon. Social Security makes it hard for people who don’t get a consistent paycheck, who work when they are on SSI, who don’t fit a cookie cutter “work in a bakery on night shift” disability job.I spend about half my days in bed, immobile and in pain. I would love more than anything to be working again at a job that I loved. But my body won’t allow it. They even put me on opioids for a bit before the epidemic became a known thing, and I weaned myself off of them and live with the pain, because on the drugs, I could not read and write and my life was one continual useless meaningless fog.Most of my neighbors here in subsidized housing are lovely people who have to deal with a small minority of terrible people who end up here and make things hard for all of us. Those people are the only ones that you probably think of when you think of poor people, just as when one might think of persons of a particular religion many people think only of religious extremists.Similarly, the greatest harm done by the bad actors among the poor is done to other poor people, statistically. We have checks stolen, packages stolen, assaults, rapes in poor neighborhoods, but most often among people who know each other. In proportion, mugging of strangers and other things that people who are not poor fear are incredibly rare.But what the priority that police provide is not enforcement, but containment, because they know who is paying their salaries, and their time is limited.When I grew up poor and rural in central Vermont, there was no shame in being poor, and to a certain extent there is still far less stigma in rural areas. So long as you are neatly put together and clean, and respectful, there’s nothing to set you below any other American.In the cities, however, being poor seems to be treated as though it were a contagion, and a shame, like leprosy in the Bible, like a venereal disease, like AIDS is, undeservedly, shunned.This is a shame on our country as a whole, and makes us less able to create a resilient culture in hard times. And, in case you hadn’t noticed — not being poor — these are hard times.Empathy is a virtue.