Social Security Student Benefits for Postsecondary Students Should Be Discontinued. Report to the Congress by the Comptroller General of the United States.

The Social Security student benefit program was reviewed by the U.S. General Accounting Office to determine if it is an unnecessary burden upon the overall Social Security system, and thus upon taxpayers supporting the system. Various U.S. Office of Education programs were also reviewed to determine if they might provide student aid more equitably than the student benefit program does. The review was conducted primarily at the Social Security Administration and the Office of Education, but financial aid records for a random sample of student benefit recipients at 119 postsecondary institutions in upstate New York and Los Angeles County, California, were also examined. It is concluded that the student benefit program gives many students more money than their school costs warrant, inequitably curtails, or bars altogether, benefits to other students, deprives nonstudents, and contributes to other federal aid programs paying unneeded benefits. The Office of Education is willing to provide aid in a more equitable way to postsecondary students now receiving payments from Social Security. It is recommended that Congress enact an amendment to the Social Security Act to discontinue student benefits for postsecondary students and take the necessary steps to assure the Office of Education will have sufficient financial resources to meet any increased demand arising from such discontinuance. (SW)