A Surprising - At Least to Me - Provision of the Social Security Law
The Social Security check sent to recipients on - or near - the first of the each month is not for that month but for the previous month. Social Security will NOT pay a monthly benefit for the month in which a death occurs.
Efforts to amend the law have been unsuccessful, in part, because it would cost the government an estimated $1.6 billion a year.
Even if a recipient dies on the last day of a month, the law - see link - requires the repayment of the check received during the first days of the following month.
Most funeral homes notify social security when they process a death which is why you occasionally hear about "backyard burials."
I don't have a link but I remember reading that Social Security does not run a check on survival until a recipient would be 102.
My question is: how does the government run a check on recipients living overseas when local authorities there may not report a death?
It would be interesting to compare the average age of social security recipients living in the US with those living overseas.