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Quick Take
Elon Musk shared a chart on X purportedly showing more than 398 million eligible numbers in the Social Security database. Online posts misconstrued the figures to wrongly claim they showed how many people are receiving benefits, which would exceed the U.S. population. The Social Security Administration reported more than 68.4 million recipients in 2024.
Full Story
Elon Musk, acting as a senior adviser to President Donald Trump and working with the Department of Government Efficiency, posted data on X, his social media platform, that he said show the numbers of “eligible” Social Security numbers by age group.
In a Feb. 17 post, Musk shared a chart from the “Social Security database,” which displayed a series of age ranges.
When added together, the data in Musk’s chart show more than 398 million people. The United States’ total population is 341 million, according to the Census Bureau.
In a subsequent X post on Feb. 17, Musk said, “Yes, there are FAR more ‘eligible’ social security numbers than there are citizens in the USA. This might be the biggest fraud in history.”
Previously, we’ve addressed Musk’s and Trump’s comments about people who are likely dead receiving Social Security benefits. As we wrote, improper payments are a legitimate concern, but the number of dead recipients still being sent benefits is likely in the thousands. In September 2015, the Social Security Administration began a process that automatically designates individuals aged 115 and older as deceased and ends payments to them.
Some social media posts misconstrued the data in Musk’s posts to wrongly claim the numbers reflected the total number of people in the U.S. who were actually receiving Social Security payments.
A Feb. 17 Facebook post said, “BREAKING – Elon Musk and DOGE have discovered that there are 394 million Social Security recipients in the U.S…. Yet the country has only 334 million citizens: a discrepancy of more than 60 million. Who’s cashing those checks & how fast can we lock them up?”
Another post repeated the figures and said, “Think you’ve seen fraud? You’ve seen nothing yet.”
Contrary to the social media claims, annual data compiled on the Social Security Beneficiary Statistics page show more than 68.4 million total beneficiaries in 2024.
Last year, 54,348,229 retired workers and their dependents received Social Security payments; 5,785,602 survivors received payments, and 8,322,142 disabled workers and their dependents received benefits.
Jeff Brown, a professor of finance at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, told us, “Elon’s 394 million is not the number of people receiving benefits. It is the number of people with Social Security numbers.”
Brown told us in an email that without access to the data cited by Musk, it’s difficult to fully address the discrepancy between the number of eligible Social Security numbers and the total U.S. population. Brown said some factors that may account for the discrepancy are people issued Social Security numbers who died outside the U.S.; people who were issued numbers because they temporarily worked in the U.S. and then returned to their home country; U.S. expatriates; people issued multiple Social Security numbers due to identity theft; coding errors in the SSA’s system; and fraudulent requests.
“It does not matter if there are dead people or ex-pats or even fictitious people with fake SSNs in their system as long as they are not awarded benefits,” Brown said. “It is when one goes to award benefits at retirement or for disability that it becomes important to verify that there is a real person.”
Who Receives Social Security Benefits
The SSA has two primary tasks: assigning Social Security numbers at birth and administering the Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance, or OASDI program, which provides a source of income when an individual retires or can’t work due to a disability.
American employees pay into the program by having money withheld from their paychecks, and must have done so for at least 10 years prior to eligibility at age 62. The amount of a Social Security retirement benefit depends on average indexed monthly earnings. In addition, those who are disabled and have worked for at least five of the prior 10 years may qualify for Social Security disability payments. Spouses and children of disabled people may also qualify for benefits.
Figures from a Social Security Administration fact sheet report that “Social Security benefits represent about 31% of the income of people over age 65.”
An SSA report from the Office of the Inspector General in July said that the administration issues more than $1 trillion in benefit payments annually. “Even the slightest error in the overall payment process can result in billions of dollars in improper payments. For example, from FYs 2015 through 2022, SSA paid almost $8.6 trillion in benefits and made approximately $71.8 billion (0.84 percent) in improper payments, most of which were overpayments,” the report said.
We reached out to the Social Security Administration for comment on the claim in the social media posts, but did not receive a response.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Meta to debunk misinformation shared on social media. Our previous stories can be found here. Meta has no control over our editorial content.
Sources
Brown, Jeff. Professor of finance, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Emails to FactCheck.org. 25 and 26 Feb 2025.
Cohen, Ben. “Trump, Musk Exaggerate Scale of Improper Social Security Payments to the Dead.” 21 Feb 2025.
Doge.gov. “Home.” Accessed 18 Feb 2025.
Investopedia. “Social Security.” Accessed 18 Feb 2025.
Social Security Administration. “Basic Facts.” Accessed 18 Feb 2025.
Social Security Administration. “OASDI Benefits.” Accessed 18 Feb 2025.
Social Security Administration. Office of the Inspector General. “Numberholders Age 100 or Older Who Did Not Have Death Information on the Numident.” Audit Report. Jul 2023.
Social Security Administration. Program Operations Manual System (POMS). “Overview of the age 115 or older termination process.” Accessed 27 Feb 2025.
Social Security Administration. “Retirement Benefit Information.” Accessed 18 Feb 2025.
Social Security Administration. “Who can get Disability.” Accessed 21 Feb 2025.
United States Census Bureau. “USA Population.” Accessed 18 Feb 2025.