Evening star., 1936-10-02
BY BLAIR MOODY.

The Job of making this social Sc
curity act "click"-of translating the
words of broadly-conceived law into
. huge, precise, smooth-running ma
chine to serve so million citizens-is
moving forward with all the speed of
. small boy going after dose Of
castor oil
The three-man Security Board,
charged with an immense RESPONSE
bility, is moving surely-and slowly.
It can scarcely be blamed. for it faces
the greatest administrative task ever
undertaken by this Government. per-
haps by any government.
It Is a task appalling in size and
confusing in complexity. 1t is a job
jammed with puzzling problems and
nice questions, the answers to many
of which have not yet been found.
One phase of the program involves a
registering operation more than twice
as large as the wartime Army draft.
Its mere mechanics contemplate acres
of records and tons Of f1les-40 to SO
million separate personal files, most
Of which will grow steadily.
From the standpoint of being ready
to function "in high" when it should
be ready, the board Is way behind.
On January !, the day the old-age
annuity program becomes effective.
1000 claims a day will start pouring
into the boards Offices On that date
26 million workers, in every State and
every industry but agriculture, will
start paying pay roll taxes and acquir-
ing a vested interest in the trust fund
which those taxes will build up. And
nobody will know who those workers
are or where they are or very much
else about them.
Fussing and Fumbling.
For, during the months when the
board should have been making ad-
ministrative decisions, completing its
procedure and registering its first &c
million" it has been fussing and fun
bling. It has waited for this and for
that. Most of all, it has waited for
election day.
This is not entirely the boards
fault. 1t would be difficult to find
three keener minds on the subject
Of social security than John G. Winant,
former Governor of New Hampshire;
Arthur j. Altmeyer, one of the main
springs of Wisconsin's progressive pro-
gram, and Vincent A. Miles, lawyer
and a smart one.
But an order from the White House
Is an order from the White House.
And this order was to let The business
Of registering" employees and sssign-
ing them benefit account numbers"
60 until the middle of November. 1t
was felt that to start a Nation wide
movement to get name, age, job facts
and other information about such q
vast number Of voters just before
election might be misinterpreted.
It might, in fact, be uble-edged
political boomerang. On the one
hand, the administration could be
charged with trying to scare" work
ers into voting for the President on
penalty of losing the benefits of the
act; on the other, it could be accused
of vast project of RECOMMENDATION. !"
The fact that the program has been
handled non-politically would GER
tainly be forgotten in the welter OF
oratory, which would hurt the pro-
gram and hurt the President.
Now members of the board say
the stalling of the last few months
OF course, they don't admit 1t was
that-will not do any harm, because,
after all, no monthly annuities are
to be paid until 1912. The claims
that will rush in at 10000 a month
in 1887 will be only small lump-sum
death and retirement claims. They
point out that, until the taxed pay
rolls are available, registration could
not be other than voluntary and that
it would be too much to expect all
the prospective beneficiaries to go
to their nearest post offices" unless
they had to.
Companies Difficulties.
But even when they do. get under
way, the whole affair promises to be
one huge headache, not ony for the
boys in Washington, but for the book
keepers of private companies, who have
70 struggle with Sucn qu1rkS as the 1act
that their tax returns under one Sec
ton of the act must be based on
wages paid" and in another on wages
payable"
There are more than 100000 en-
ployers who must make returns for
the tax under the act and whose en-
ployes are eligible for annuities when
they retire at IS or later. Every hot
dog operator, garageman, barber and
bootlegger who hires more than one
person is taxable employer" The
job of collecting from them belongs
to the Bureau Of Internal Revenue.
The job Of keeping record of all the
money their employees make from jan
uary until they are 65 belongs to the
Security Board.