Government Targets Taxpayers for Parent's Decade Old Debts

[Sailboat]

By far the most disturbing part of the article is not that they’re trying to collect decades-old debts from children of deceased taxpayers, but that lack of records and their own uncertainty don’t seem to slow down the money grab:

Now, Social Security claims it overpaid someone in the Grice family — it’s not sure who — in 1977.

The government doesn’t look into exactly who got the overpayment…

The feds insisted that he owed $172 but could provide no documents to back up the claim.

Multiple cases where the agency isn’t sure what happened and can’t prove it, but by God, wants some money.

If possible, it gets worse:

The Treasury initially held the full amount of Grice’s federal and state refunds, a total of $4,462. Last week, after The Washington Post inquired about Grice’s case, the government returned the portion of her refund above the $2,996 owed on her father’s account.

If I’m reading that right, they seized more than they were owed and only returned the excess to which they were clearly not entitled under the pressure of public scrutiny. That would be infuriating.