As an ID number it has almost nothing to recommended it, especially compared to modern equivalents in Europe. It wasn’t meant to be a national ID number.
The only reason we use it for identification in the US is that a common ID is often useful but Americans have always been phobic to mandatory census.
Obviously they’re fine handling all that information to data brokers, however.
The concept of a SSN is crazy
As an ID number it has almost nothing to recommended it, especially compared to modern equivalents in Europe. It wasn’t meant to be a national ID number.
The only reason we use it for identification in the US is that a common ID is often useful but Americans have always been phobic to mandatory census.
Obviously they’re fine handling all that information to data brokers, however.