Court: Social Security Can Be Used To Pay Debt (Student Loan Payment)

P/MSNBC ^ | 12/07/2005 | AP

[TCats]

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Wednesday that the government can seize a person’s Social Security benefits to pay old student loans.

Retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor wrote the decision that went against a disabled man, James Lockhart, who had sued claiming he needed all of his $874 monthly check to pay for food and medication.

Lockhart, 67, a former postal worker who now lives in public housing in Seattle, has heart disease, diabetes and other health problems. He has about $77,000 in student loan debt....

[TCats]

I wonder why they didn't try to collect this long ago through regular collection means. This guy was a Postal Service employee and I think he would have been subject to a collection action.

[wideawake]

Lockhart, 67, a former postal worker who now lives in public housing in Seattle, has heart disease, diabetes and other health problems.

I sprained my ankle. Can I skip a month on my mortgage?

[samadams2000]

Joe Lockharts father?

[Pondman88]

seems common sense to me. The guy paid a lot of money to get edumacated, and all he got was a postal service job????

[Pondman88]

seems common sense to me. The guy paid a lot of money to get edumacated, and all he got was a postal service job????

[Mikey_1962]

Just in time for the Pepsi generation to retire...

[Joe 6-pack]

This is why both social security AND government subsidized education should be done away with. (I had to think long and hard before omitting the Postal Service from my list).

[Kenton]

If this guy is 67, he was college-age around 50 years ago. If he amassed a $77,000 college loan debt back when college costs averaged less than $1000 a year, he must have gotten some mighty fine education. Or else somethings wrong with this story.

Like, he could have gotten his doctorate at an Ivy League college and had money to spare back in 1955. So why'd he wind up working for the post office and living in the projects?

[tfecw]

Argh!

Not am I only paying down a 6 figure student loan, but I get to pay down someone else's student load.

[Western Phil]

The federal student loan system was not in place in 1955. It started after Sputnik.

[TCats]

That was my take as well. The article doesn't give enough background as to when the loans were obtained, what the guy actually studied/degrees he got, and what prior collection steps the Gov't took. Does anyone else have more info?

[steve-b]

Two words: "interest" and "penalties".

[mugs99]

I wonder why they didn't try to collect this long ago through regular collection means.

Because it isn't about student loans. This opens the door for politicians to take money from social security.
.

[steve-b]

This opens the door for politicians to take money from social security.

That door has already been not only opened, but unbolted from its hinges and taken out of the doorway.

[mugs99]

If he amassed a $77,000

The interest owed is far more than the original student loan.
.

[A Ruckus of Dogs]

Retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor wrote the decision that went against a disabled man, James Lockhart, who had sued claiming he needed all of his $874 monthly check to pay for food and medication.

Ok, take his SS check and give him a welfare check. It's just creative accounting

[TCats]

A litte more of the details of this story:

Preventing the withholding of Social Security benefits for such long-term debtors, argues the government, "would deprive the Secretary (of Education) of the most efficient (and, in many instances, the only) means of collecting delinquent debt to the United States."

Lockhart received four college loans between 1984 and 1989, and by 2002 he had failed to repay about $80,000 in debts. Starting that year, up to $143.10 a month in Social Security was being withheld from his monthly disability check, totaling about $3,555. In addition to the time limitations, Lockhart also claims he had filed for bankruptcy and therefore was protected from the withholding penalty.

[TCats]

Looks like that's what they were doing. He was on disability and they were taking part of it to repay although the amount they were taking wouldn't cover the interest let alone repayment - See my prior post.

[PaxMacian]

This opens the door for students now who know well that they won't ever collect any social security to take student loans in exchange for all the cash they are forced to fork over to the previous generation of slackers and embezzlers.