CUED

Immigrants and Labor

Feature:

Social Security Administration's No-Match Letter Program: Implications for Immigration Enforcement Arrangements
November 2003; Chirag Mehta, Nik Theodore, and Marielena Hincapie

Abstract
The U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA) began its employer “no-match letter” program to help properly allocate the billions of dollars of contributions collected from workers with incorrectly filed Social Security numbers (SSNs). Under the program, SSA sends letters to employers every year that identify the Social Security numbers of employees who do not match names or numbers in SSA’s records. The goal of the no-match letter program is to reduce the size of the Earnings Suspense File (ESF), which holds unallocated funds collected from workers whose SSN filed on their W-2s does not match names in SSA’s database.

Although they were not designed as a mechanism of immigration enforcement,
employer no-match letters inadvertently have become de facto immigration enforcement tools. Employers have fired thousands of workers identified in no-match letters, assuming that they are undocumented immigrants. In addition, many workers identified in the letters have quit their jobs out of concern that immigration authorities may raid their workplace. Further evidence indicates that many employers have used the letters to undermine workers’ right to organize and to cut pay and benefits. This study, conducted by the Center for Urban Economic Development at the University of Illinois at Chicago and immigrant rights organizations, assesses the wideranging impacts of SSA’s no-match letter program on local labor markets and immigration enforcement efforts. The findings are based on the results of the No-Match Letter Survey of 921 workers who were identified in no-match letters sent to 342 employers in 18 states.

Publications:

Immigration and Labor

• Chicago's Undocumented Immigrants and Their Access to Higher Education; (March 2003)
• Chicago's Undocumented Immigrants: An Analysis of Wages, Working Conditions, and Economic Contributions; (Feb. 2002)

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UIC-Center for Urban Economic Development