Not only was SSN not intended to be a national id, it was explicitly not supposed to be a national id. In the era when SSN was established, Nazi Germany and it

Not only was SSN not intended to be a national id, it was explicitly not supposed to be a national id. In the era when SSN was established, Nazi Germany and its emphasis on "papers, please" was on the public's mind. SSN was intended to be used solely for tax purposes, not as a form of national identity. There were legal constraints on when government agencies can even ask for SSN, limited to legitimate tax purposes. Sadly, these protections have been whittled down over time: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-09-15/this-loophole-ends-the-privacy-of-social-security-numbers https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-09-15/this-loop... > Federal law is supposed to protect the privacy of your Social Security number from government inquiries -- but apparently that doesn’t extend to a check on whether you’ve paid back taxes and child support. In a decision with worrying implications for those who oppose a single national identification number, a divided federal appeals court has rejected a lawyer’s refusal to submit his Social Security number along with his renewal of Maryland bar membership. > The state says it needs Social Security numbers to make sure lawyers’ child support and taxes are up to date. The court’s majority said that was enough to fit the Social Security number under the federal law that allows states to use your number for tax purposes. That definition is so loose that it enables states to ask for your Social Security number pretty much whenever they want -- even when their records have been hacked. Really, the government should make it possible for citizens to create an arbitrary number of different tax ids (SSNs), as many as they want. One for every firm they do business with, one for every employer, and so on.