Social Security is full of its share of tricky rules regarding benefit calculation and taxability, a topic that Spidell covers often in our various publications. Today, however, we will not determine the indexed amount for each year prior to age 60, by multiplying the amount earned (but not more than the maximum wages subject to FICA) by a ratio of the “average wage index” amount for … Zzz zzz zzz.
Instead, here are some interesting facts about the Social Security program and its history.
Ernest Ackerman of Cleveland got the first lump-sum Social Security payment for 17 cents in January 1937. Lump-sum payouts were the only form of benefits paid during the start-up period January 1937 through December 1939. Ackerman retired one day after the Social Security program began. During his one day of participation in the program, a nickel was withheld from his pay for Social Security.1
Ida May Fuller, a retired legal secretary and stenographer from Vermont, was the first beneficiary of recurring monthly Social Security payments. On January 31, 1940, Ms. Fuller received Social Security check number 00-000-001 in the amount of $22.54 (equivalent to $518 in 2025).2
Social Security numbers issued before June 2011 were assigned in a particular structure: The first three digits are an area number, the next two digits represent a group number, and the last four digits are the serial number. Since June 2011, SSNs are assigned randomly, removing any geographic, birth/location significance. The Social Security Administration (SSA) does not reuse Social Security numbers. It has issued over 450 million since the start of the program, and it says it has enough to last several generations without reuse and without changing the number of digits.3
The SSA stops payments to those over 115 years old. To catch any deaths that may have escaped reporting, the SSA regularly checks that its oldest beneficiaries are using their Medicare benefits — if they’re not, the SSA verifies that the beneficiary is still alive. In the extremely rare cases where benefits are paid to people over 100 years old, the SSA has a policy to stop payments by age 115.4 Only 0.1% of Social Security benefits are paid to people over 100 years old.5
