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What happens when the US runs out of SSNs?
(lemmy.world)
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this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2024
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The maximum possible combinations given the current rules set forth by the SSA is 888,931,098.
The United States population on October 11, 2024 is: 337,248,197 The estimated population of humans on earth is 8,078,345,740
The social security administration has said they have enough SSNs to last for about the next 70 years, and will address this issue in the future.
Shouldn't they do it while the COBOL people are alive to fix the code?
But people have been born and died, no? I’m sure total used is closer to something like 500-600 million?
Yeah the total number of SSNs already used would be higher than the current population, I would think. It didn't seem to me that poster was trying to estimate SSNs used/left, just provide some important numbers as relevant context.
It's been going since 1936 so ~90 years, and they reckon ~70 years left, so we have roughly 45% duration remaining. I'm guessing the rate of use speeds up over time and that has been accounted for, so probably we have more than 45% of the actual numbers left? I think I'd guess 450 million total used ssns.