Last year, it suddenly fell to me to manage the affairs of a couple of ailing and now deceased elderly people (my parents-in-law).
The experience offers a useful perspective on the efficiency and responsiveness of various institutions. The worst were, big surprise, a cable company and a health plan administrator. Banks varied in their customer service, with small banks generally more pleasant to deal with than big ones.
One organization stood out from the rest for its sheer, ruthless efficiency: the Social Security Administration. I called only once, and with a predicted wait time of more than an hour opted for a callback. A representative did and informed me that the thing I wanted to ask her to do (adjust benefits to reflect the death of a spouse) had already been taken care of.
So when newly minted government-efficiency expert Elon Musk hints — without providing any evidence — that there is serious fraud at the Social Security Administration, I must say I’m extremely dubious.
Sure, checks sometimes go out to recipients who shouldn’t receive them, with the SSA estimating that it made $13.6 billion in overpayments in the 2023 fiscal year. But that was out of $1.3 trillion in disbursements.