Social Security kicks off 'Retire Online'

WASHINGTON - The Social Security Administration, anticipating 10,000 baby boomers applying for benefits every day in the near future, has put together a new online service that will allow people to get their benefits without ever traveling to a Social Security field office.

The agency, in introducing the program yesterday, said most people will be able to apply for their retirement or disability benefits in 15 minutes or less.

Academy Award-winning actress Patty Duke, spokeswoman for the Retire Online campaign, acknowledged that her own computer skills "are wanting." But her husband gave her a demonstration, she said Monday, "and I was able to do it with my limited skills. It was very user-friendly."

The administration is betting that a great majority of baby boomers, the first to grow old in the computer age, will share that opinion.

"We have nearly 80 million baby boomers coming in," Social Security Commissioner Michael J. Astrue said. "We just don't have the infrastructure to handle that workload in the traditional fashion."

The agency estimates that the baby boom generation will become eligible for retirement at a rate of 10,000 a day for the next 20 years.

The Social Security system already faces a long-term financial crisis as fewer workers finance the retirements of more senior citizens. In 2008, it was paying out about $614 billion to 50 million retirees and their dependents, disabled workers and survivors.

The agency has had versions of online applications since 2000, but in the past applicants have still had to mail or deliver paper documents with their signatures and copies of birth certificates or W-2 forms.

In the future, the process should be paperless in the majority of cases.

"We redid it from scratch. It's easier to use, it's faster," Astrue said. He said it now takes about 45 minutes for a field officer to finish an application form for a person who visits a Social Security office.

ASSOCIATED PRESS