Robert Myers Ball (March 28, 1914 – January 29, 2008) was an American Social Security official, who served under three presidents (Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon), from 1962 to 1973, as Commissioner of Social Security. He is the longest-serving head of the Social Security Administration to date. He also founded the National Academy for Social Insurance. He graduated from Wesleyan University in 1935, and in 1936 received a master's degree in economics from the same institution.
In the second half of the twentieth century, no one exerted more influence over Social Security than Robert Ball, who in 1947 wrote the key statement defining why social insurance, not welfare, should be America's primary income maintenance program.
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“Hey, you dress up our town very nicely. You don’t look out the Chamber of Commerce is going to list you in their publicity with the local attractions.”
—Robert M. Fresco, and Jack Arnold. Dr. Matt Hastings (John Agar)
“I don’t like comparisons with football. Baseball is an entirely different game. You can watch a tight, well-played football game, but it isn’t exciting if half the stadium is empty. The violence on the field must bounce off a lot of people. But you can go to a ball park on a quiet Tuesday afternoon with only a few thousand people in the place and thoroughly enjoy a one-sided game. Baseball has an aesthetic, intellectual appeal found in no other team sport.”
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