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A few years back, I tried to renew my Driver's License. I didn't have anything to PROVE my SS#, so I couldn't renew it. I asked what I needed. They said that a W-2 would do. I said that I don't get W-2's because I'm self-employed. I brought back something that showed my SS# as my "taxpayer Id number". That wasn't good enough. It had to say "SS #". I think on my third try, I'd found my passport, and THIS clerk told me that the other clerk had been full of it.
[a href="http://www.impactpress.com/articles/decjan02/musings12102.html"]National Id[/a]
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Heh. I guess I need to read up on those UBB codes.
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Hyperlinks are a little different with UBB codes.
National Id
So, why didn't you just bring your Social Security card? If you don't have one, you should contact your local SS office.
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I didn't have my SS card at the time. I'd lost it when I was 16. Some time AFTER all this happened, my ex sent me the SS card I was sent after my name changed when I got married. He'd found it while looking for something else.
There was a time when we didn't need the card, so it just stayed in the file or the safety deposit box. We've noticed of late that it isn't enough to know your number. Even employers want to see the card. [It's around her somewhere now.]
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Probably the employers need to see the card as part of their compliance program with INS regulations.
A few years ago the Department of Justice started a crackdown on illegal workers and have a list of documents that an employee must provide to the employer before they can legally begin work. It doesn't seem to have stopped illegal immigrants from getting employment but has probably done wonders for the forged documents industry. The whole thing is a real pain in the ass especially when dealing with summer employees when you have a kid come in for a job and you have to ask them to provide social security cards, birth certificates, etc. when you have known them since they were born.
Compliance with the law probably varies from employer to employer but in our business compliance with federal and state laws is something we are audited for on an annual basis so we jump thropugh the hoops.
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Anita, the acquisition and maintenance of SS cards has a distinct gender bias, due to the fact that men don't usually have cause for legal changes to their surname. (Exception made for some of the men who post here!)
I had a SS card in my maiden name. Got married, got a new SS card. Got divorced, had my name legally changed back to my maiden name, didn't get a new SS card. Got married again, didn't get a new SS card. Got divorced again (shame on me...no more marriages in my fortune cookie!), changed name back to maiden name, didn't get a new SS card.
Now, in order to get a new, legitimate SS card, I would have to appear in person at a SS office with documents, including proof of:
- <LI> My birth certificate (don't have it)
<LI> My first divorce
<LI> My legal name change to my maiden name
<LI> My second marriage
<LI> My second divorce
<LI> My second legal name change to my maiden name.
It just hasn't been worth the trouble.
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Between my bungling the link and mentioning SS, I think we seem to have lost track of the original question. What do you think of a National ID card?
Washington Post Article on it
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Anita:
My SS card was paper. I lost it back in the 60's. Well, I didn't actually lose it. I was on a backpacking trip. We had to cross the upper reaches of the Rio Grande. Everything in my wallet that was paper, dissolved. Lost a few presidents that day. That was that.
They don't actually need the card. They can take your checking or saving account number, your employee number, etc, and find you SS number. They can also get it from your arrest record if you have one. ;< )
It is a national ID.
Best Wishes,,,,
Z
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Anita, a lot of people think we already have a national ID card. It's called a SS card. What do I think of a national ID card? Per my previous post, for me it has been a PITA. I supposed if we had a second national ID card that served the same function a SS already does, I'd have to go through 12 steps instead of the 6 I mentioned above. Sorry for the thread drift.
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No, no, no. I'm against it. (1) I doubt it will stop terrorists especially not those that are already here. (2) Let's just have a card for NON-citizens. For the citizens let's leave well enough alone.
"One of the most practical of our present safeguards of privacy is the fragmented nature of personal information. It is scattered in little bits across the geography and years of our life. Retrieval is impractical and often impossible. A central data bank removes completely this safeguard." Congressman Frank Horton
This latest incarnation of the National ID card is the brainchild of Larry Ellison. Let it begin and end with him.
[img]=http://www.templetons.com/brad/larry2.gif[/img]
