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Thread: Social Security, Treasury Target Americans For Their Parents' Old Debts

  1. #1
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    Default Social Security, Treasury Target Americans For Their Parents' Old Debts

    Many Americans expecting to see their tax refunds in their bank accounts soon are waking up to a very different scenario: the government actively intercepting their checks in order to pay back debts they’re not responsible for.

    According to a new report in the Washington Post, the federal government is seizing nearly $2 billion from hundreds of thousands of taxpayers this year in order to settle debts, some incurred by their parents, some dating back to more than a decade.

    This process has been ongoing since 2011, when a revision in the farm bill passed by Congress removed the 10-tear statute of limitations on debts owed to the United States. Since that bill was passed, the government has collected $424 million on debts older than a decade. This year, however, has seen the Social Security Administration (SSA) alone claim that 400,000 Americans owe a total of $714 million in debts older than 10 years.

    Multiple government agencies told the Post they were not responsible for pushing for the change, with Social Security spokeswoman Dorothy Clark saying, “We have an obligation to current and future Social Security beneficiaries to attempt to recoup money that people received when it was not due.”

    In one case documented by the newspaper, 58-year-old Mary Grice of Maryland discovered her tax refund had been seized by the government to pay for a debt she did not even know existed, and had been incurred under her father’s Social Security number. Her father died in 1960, but her mother – also deceased now – received survivor’s benefits, and the SSA claims it overpaid someone back in 1977 although it is not sure who.

    As a result, the agency targeted the oldest sibling – Mary – to pay off the 37-year-old debt. If she was unable to pay it in full, it would have moved down to the next sibling.

    “It was a shock,” Grice told the Post. “What incenses me is the way they went about this. They gave me no notice, they can’t prove that I received any overpayment, and they use intimidation tactics, threatening to report this to the credit bureaus.”

    Although the Federal Trade Commission’s website states that citizens “typically are not obligated to pay the debts of a deceased relative from their own assets,” the SSA said that if a member indirectly gets assistance from Social Security benefits, their money can be confiscated to repay debts regardless of how old it is.

    “While we are responsible for collecting delinquent debts owed to taxpayers, we understand the importance of ensuring that debtors are treated fairly,” the Treasury Department’s Jeffrey Schramek said to the Post.

    Treasury officials also stated that before someone’s refund can be seized, evidence of the debt must exist. In Grice’s case, however, SSA officials told the woman that no records existed certifying the debt’s validity.

    “The craziest part of this whole thing is the way the government seizes a child’s money to satisfy a debt that child never even knew about,” Grice’s attorney, Robert Vogel, said. “They’ll say that somebody got paid for that child’s benefit, but the child had no control over the money and there’s no way to know if the parent ever used the money for the benefit of that kid.”

    Grice isn’t the only person this is happening to, of course, but she’s lucky in that Vogel decided to take on her case for free. Others who’ve seen their refunds taken – ranging from a few hundred dollars to more than a couple of thousand – cannot afford to mount a legal challenge and therefore don’t. Vogel told the Post he’s very concerned about the statute lifted by Congress.

    “Can the government really bring back to life a case that was long dead?” he asked. “Can it really be right to seize a child’s money to satisfy a parent’s debt?”


    http://rt.com/usa/social-security-tr...americans-968/

  2. #2
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    All comes back to the Rule of Law. They write some crap down on paper, sign it and then jam it down our throats. If you don't do what it says they take everything you have and put you in a cage.

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    Numbers 14:18
    18 ‘The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and the fourth generation.’

    I have lain awake many a night worrying about that part.

    Having your refund check confiscated because one of your parents turned to the government for help is really only a minor problem compared to what is in store for many of us, I am afraid.

  4. #4
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    Number 1. Don't allow excess taxes to be taken out so you get a "refund". You're giving the feds a interest free loan on your money.

    Number 2. Demand an itemized list of all the charges they claim you "owe". If they can't provide one, don't pay a dime. You don't trust .govs word do you?

    Number 3. Take the IRS to Tax Court. Make them specify exactly why you should pay for someone else's alleged debt. I've challenged them in the past in Tax Court and the IRS backed off once they got notice of the court date.

    Number 4. Use something like Tax Defense Partners to work it out for you.

    Don't let the bullies push you around. I know that's another thread but it applies here too.
    2Tim. 3:1 ¶ But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come.
    2Tim. 4:3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires;
    2Tim. 4:4 and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths.


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    Quote Originally Posted by Miradus View Post
    Numbers 14:18
    18 ‘The Lord is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and the fourth generation.’

    I have lain awake many a night worrying about that part.

    Having your refund check confiscated because one of your parents turned to the government for help is really only a minor problem compared to what is in store for many of us, I am afraid.
    You worry in vain:
    Deut. 24,16 The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his own sin.
    2Kings 14,6 But the children of the murderers he slew not: according unto that which is written in the book of the law of Moses, wherein the Lord commanded, saying, The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, nor the children be put to death for the fathers; but every man shall be put to death for his own sin.
    2Chr. 25,4 But he slew not their children, but did as it is written in the law in the book of Moses, where the Lord commanded, saying, The fathers shall not die for the children, neither shall the children die for the fathers, but every man shall die for his own sin.
    2Tim. 3:1 ¶ But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come.
    2Tim. 4:3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires;
    2Tim. 4:4 and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths.


  6. #6
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    Social Security is coming after me for $1400 as they say they overpaid for my mom's auto accident in 2009. She had insurance, so I don't understand why they don't hit up the insurance company. She passed away in 2011.
    Semper Fi

    Jesus Christ is Always Faithful


    AMERICANISM
    NOT
    GLOBALISM

    Ban GODWIT

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    Do you have a staff of lawyers, because the insurance company does. Just a guess on my part.



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    The last thing an empire plunders is its own people.


    Earl
    That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

    Withdraw consent!

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    Quote Originally Posted by Earl Sinclair View Post
    The last thing an empire plunders is its own people.


    Earl
    I'd like to get a report on the average age of vehicles being stopped by police. I can sure see the trend. They are pulling over new cars to feed their beast.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Seditious View Post
    I'd like to get a report on the average age of vehicles being stopped by police. I can sure see the trend. They are pulling over new cars to feed their beast.
    I'm not sure the age of the vehicle has much to do with "pull overs". I got stopped in an 11 year old truck.
    2Tim. 3:1 ¶ But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come.
    2Tim. 4:3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires;
    2Tim. 4:4 and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths.


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