Hundreds of thousands of Black children who lost a parent could be missing out on Social Security payments

After Dr. Sarah Williams lost her husband Clarence to lung cancer in 2015, her grief was soon accompanied by financial worries about providing for their 9-year-old twins. 

Affording basics like school supplies and field trips strained Williams' part-time professor salary in North Carolina for more than a year. Eventually she discovered her twins were eligible for federal survivor payments from the Social Security Administration (SSA) for children who lose a parent. Both children soon started receiving payments of hundreds of dollars a month, helping to alleviate the financial burden that came with their father's death.

But many Black children who lose a parent never see benefits like those that helped Williams' family, a problem that has drawn the attention of advocates and lawmakers who say the SSA should be doing more to close the racial gap that exists among children who receive benefits and those who don't.