Initiative seeks to reward adult immigrants who have worked in California but are undocumented

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A wave of hundreds of thousands of undocumented workers who are reaching or past retirement age in the U.S. but who are ineligible to receive Social Security benefits, even though many paid automatic payroll taxes into that system for years. A new state bill in California proposes to offer undocumented older adults an economic safety net when they can no longer work. AB 1536 would expand a state-funded cash assistance program, which currently offers individuals about $1,100 per month (PDF), to cover undocumented residents aged 65 and older as well.

“We want our immigrants to age with dignity and not in complete poverty, and we want the Cash Assistance Program for Immigrants (CAPI) to be open to include elderly and disabled undocumented individuals in California,” said Angelica Salas, director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights in Los Angeles (CHIRLA).

The bill that was introduced by Assemblymember Juan Carrillo (D-Palmdale), in Sacramento months ago.
“If we do not create a [safety net] system for this population, we are going to have a severe crisis of individuals who have labored and contributed to California, but who will then live in severe poverty in the very same state where they left their youth,” Salas said in a recent interview.

Immigrants who are hired without valid work authorization in industries like construction and food services often provide a Social Security number that is fake, expired or not their own. Most employers in California and other states, who are not required to check the validity of the nine-digit number (PDF), deduct Social Security, federal, state and other taxes from the workers’ paychecks, like with any other employee.

The result is that nationwide, unauthorized immigrant workers contributed a whopping $13 billion in automatic payroll taxes to the Social Security system in a single year, according to the most recent estimates by the Social Security Administration.
The bill is in process awaiting a vote.