My dad never drew Social Security per se.

If all goes well I won’t be drawing it until I turn 70.

Well, that’s not exactly true. I have already benefited from Social Security. And in a way so did my dad.

My dad, after selling his share in Wyatt’s Hardware to his older brother Pershing, went to work as superintendent of the Lincoln Cemetery District  that had three cemeteries — Lincoln, Sheridan and Manzanita in the rolling hills northeast of Lincoln.

He collapsed while cutting the lawn on a riding lawnmower on an early August afternoon in 1965. He died of a heart attack ironically within 10 feet of his mother Millie Beermann Wyatt’s grave.

Dad was 54 when he died.

My mom was 42. I was nine, my sister 3 and my older brothers 13 and 15. Life insurance paid off the mortgage. But other than that, my mom supported us by working with the help of her widow and dependent checks for children under 18 from Social Security.

My mom worked until she turned 80. She was working part-time at the time of my dad’s death. After that, she went to work fulltime and then some.

Rest assured that the jobs she was able to get over the years — grocery store clerk, candy store worker, cashier at a liquor store, and a sales clerk at a hardware — were all basically minimum-wage affairs without benefits.

And the 8 years she went into business owning a frosty — think independent versions of the Sno-White drive-in genre — she named The Squirrel Cage which was fitting in more ways than one, was in many ways not much more lucrative than working minimum wage jobs.

The big difference was she was her own boss. That meant seven-day work days were the norm with 10 to 12 hours at the frosty and an hour or so of doing the books at home. Occasionally, she had Saturdays off or an entire weekend off.

My brothers both had newspaper routes. As soon as they were old enough to obtain a work permit they got jobs. And when my mom owned the frosty they both worked there as well in addition to their other jobs.

I was able to start working at the frosty when I was 15. And just like by brothers, I was paid the lower wage allowed for under 18 workers in California at the time. The pay was 85 percent below the minimum age.

When I turned 15, I ended up going to work for the Lincoln News Messenger as a sports editor, photographer, and covered city council meetings for 15 cents per column inch for all copy published and $1 per photo used and for every roll of film I developed.

For, what we made, we were expected to pay for a share of our expenses. It meant we bought most of our own clothes and when we got a car we paid for it, and covered all operating costs including insurance.

And after we turned 18, we started paying household expenses while we were still living at home and either going to college or before we were out on our own. My oldest brother paid the PG&E bill. I paid the phone bill and we all contributed $100 or so toward food.

Turning 18 was a significant milestone. That is when Social Security benefits for dependents lapsed.

This is not an effort to point out how tough it was because it really wasn’t. We were far from being well off but we never missed a meal.

And even though my mom had four kids to raise on her own, if one of our friends or a young relatives hit a rough spot my mom would take them in for a few days or months at a time until things started getting better for them.

I was amazed at the memorial service for my mother the number of people who considered her their second mom.

Although the Social Security dependent survivors and the widow check weren’t a significant amount of money there is no doubt in my mind without them things would have been a lot different.

It enabled my mom to combine what work she could get to be able to raise four kids on her own.

And while nearly nine out of every 10 people age 65 and older received Social Security benefits in 2024, it is more than just a retirement fund.

There were more than $1.6 trillion in Social Security benefits paid in 2024 to nearly 69 million Americans.

The biggest chunk was $102.2 billion that went to 51.8 million retired workers. Their average benefit was $1,975 a month.

Another $11.4 billion went to 7.2 million disabled workers plus $500 million to their dependents under age 18. The average monthly payment to disabled workers was $1,581 a month.

Of those that rely on Social Security after age 65, 39 percent of the male beneficiaries and 44 percent of the females receive 50 percent or more of their income from Social Security. Drilling down further, 12 percent of the men and 15 percent of the women among elderly recipients rely on Social Security for 90 percent or more of their income.

Survivor benefits went to 5.8 million people — surviving spouses and their dependent under 18. That amount came to $8.9 billion. The average monthly benefit was $1,546.

The proceeding data from 2024 was gleaned from a fact sheet issued by the Social Security Administration.

Social Security is not just for old age. Just over $11.9 billion went to workers that paid into the system that became disabled and cannot work and their young dependents as well as survivors.

The need to keep Social Security solvent is clearly not just an old age issue.

The best way to do so is to put more people to work. And one of the most effective ways, believe it or not, is immigration.

Since 2000, the United States had an average just of one million legal immigrants on an annual basis. The overwhelming majority end up paying into Social Security within years after they arrive through gainful employment. And their children do the same as they enter adulthood.

The argument that immigrants are a drain ignores reality. Welfare rolls have not swollen by 20 million since 2000.

The percentage of American receiving welfare — with SNAP (food stamps) being the largest — is 12.3 percent of the population or 41.7 million in 2024. The percentage is not being pushed up by legal immigration. And it is down from 19 percent in 2020.

Fixing immigration to allow more in legally — especially with our birthrate dropping from 3.8 births per woman in 1970 to 1.59 births per woman in 2024 — is a key component to shoring up Social Security.

There needs to be more workers paying into the system to help support retired workers.

The dropping birth rate, institutionalized generational welfare that is home grown, and increases in longevity are what imperil Social Security.

The degree to which contributions and benefits ultimate may have to be tweaked depends upon how many new people are entering the workforce.

And one keyway is to harness legal immigration to provide more economic growth.

—  This column is the opinion of Dennis Wyatt, and does not necessarily represent the opinions of The Courier or 209 Multimedia. He may be reached at dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com