> They hadn’t started collecting social security due to some debts and was worried it would ALL be garnished.

Is this common? I knew a guy who had the same mindset. I ended up paying him in cash for some work, he was convinced that if he made any money in a traditional role it would be instantly garnished.

It is unfortunately common. We're not perfectly rational robots, and so for a decent subset of the population, they go off what has happened to them.

And being paid $1k and assuming they'd have $1k and then discovering they only had $500 because of garnishment tells them "don't accept checks, cash is the only safe method".

And then it's not a step much further to be "it's not worth setting up social security because it'll all be taken".

People forget that there is a population group where fines are MORE HARMFUL than jail time. At least with jail, you can serve your time and be done.

You do realize jail isn't some magical unifying force of social justice right?

A while back a guy destroyed a vehicle of mine and drove off. Per criminal law in my jurisdiction, he should have served at least 45 days for that offense. But it isn't like that would ever give me my property back. It's also unlikely to deter that particular crime in the population.

Sure, jail isn't a solution in many cases, but fines aren't either.

Don't you still leave jail with new debts because they charge you for your stay?

Real, actual people exist who turn down raises because they're convinced it'd cause them to lose money, because they don't understand how marginal tax rates work. I don't mean low-income earners who may in fact lose out or not gain from a raise due to benefits cliffs, I mean people earning low-six-figures who think if their pay goes any higher "my tax rate will go up and I'll lose money" and are weirdly resistant to being convinced otherwise.

In many cases I think it has more to do with having to jump through a bunch of hoops with no assurance of what the outcome will be.

Another person needed an ID. In order to apply for the ID they needed a birth certificate. In order to apply for it they had to fill out the application, mail it with money, and then have a permanent place to have the birth certificate mailed an unknown amount of time later. At which point they then needed to apply for the ID and go through that process.

It's no different than people not investing in their 401k and getting the free match because they're worried about paying "penalties" when they take it back out. My employer has a 50% match and early withdrawal penalty is only 10% and yet, people still refuse to do it.

> They hadn’t started collecting social security due to some debts and was worried it would ALL be garnished.

Your contractor’s actions makes a some twisted sense to me as he’s still receiving ‘undisclosed’ cash. The homeless veteran doesn’t make any sense to me as he was not receiving the social security funds at all.

If I told you that you had a bunch of forms to fill out, and after doing all the work you'd get no money (and it would all go to your hated ex-wife or something), you might not bother doing it.

First, anyone skipping out on their responsibilities shouldn’t be getting a sympathetic reaction (and, yeah, I know they always have stories about how it’s justified in their case - my dad spent a lot of time hanging out with other deadbeats but every time details came out, surprise, surprise, they were leaving out a lot).

Paying people under the table has a lot of potential liability for you and it almost always catches up with them. Especially now it’s just not viable to live off the grid (e.g. hoping you don’t get sick isn’t effective) and all this does is ensure that the amount they owe the IRS is unaffordable when the bill finally arrives, usually when their earning potential has gone down.

Sure - all of those are true; just explaining why someone might not sign up for social security, even if the reasons don't actually pan out.

The above example was someone who FEARED all of their money would be garnished. Not someone who was TOLD all of the money would be garnished.

That isn't the same thing.

It sounds like they're used to being nickel -and-dimed or having money taken away from them.