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Originally Posted by LouisVanDerWright
^^^ One that doesn't want people to rely on it as their only retirement plan? SSI is supposed to simply prevent people from falling into total destitution, not provide a retirement.
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SSI is used by people who have *never* been able to hold down a job, mostly severely disabled people and, occasionally, widowed spouses who, for whatever reason, don't qualify for spousal support under SS or SSDI, so probably too old to realistically get work. You're expecting them to get a job? The person I know best who is on SSI has suffered from auditory hallucinations and severe paranoia for a decade and currently complains constantly about "mind control," a very real, scary example of what might be called "tin-foil hat" paranoia. He's spent over a year in psychiatric hospital in just the past five years. He will *never* be employable, barring some sort of miraculous new pharmaceutical treatment. And his parents are citizens but as working-class immigrants even just housing and feeding a grown adult iwith serious issues strains their finances.
The "official" reason SSI doesn't get more is that states and other agencies are supposed to help bridge the gap, but it seems like a horribly inefficient way to distribute resources and one that varies widely from state to state and is dependant on strained people navigating a collection of agencies that even I have trouble keeping track of.
Regular SSDI is for previously employed people who are disabled. Regular SS is for retired folk. But even regular SS wasn't supposed to be a full retirement plan although millions of people use it as their only source of retirement income.