Social Security Scandal Shakes Japan

The AP reports:

After reading a book this year about serious flaws in Japan's pension system, retired deliveryman Yoshikazu Hirano thought he'd check his own records just to be safe.

He's glad he did: The 74-year-old discovered the government had shortchanged him by 460,000 yen ($3,770) in benefits he accrued while driving a truck for three years in the 1950s and 60s.

Hirano wasn't alone. Shortly afterward, the government confessed to losing track of pension records linked to an astounding 64 million claims -- igniting a scandal that has punished the ruling party at the polls and eroded confidence in the ability of the world's second largest economy to support its growing legions of elderly.

Hirano, who is single and lives outside Tokyo, felt defrauded. "Had I not asked, I would have never gotten the money back," he said.

Democracy a God that sometimes fails.Imagine that.