Why old people hate the government

That's a photo of my phone. The number you see displayed is the time that it took me to call the Social Security office to change the address and phone number of ONE of my parents. That's right, it took me 12 minutes and 51 seconds to change the address of each parent. For 25 minutes and 42 seconds, I sat on the phone and listened to their "easy and convenient" automated system. (This does not take into account the five previous times I called and listened to about half of the recording only to find out that I needed to have additional information.)

During my "automated menu" time I learned:

- Unemployment numbers are high because there are no more humans answering phones.
- If you don't have a touch tone phone, you get to talk to one of the rare humans. (Yes, I considered choosing this option.)
- If you don't know your mother's maiden name, you are screwed.
- You can't change your address if you're not receiving benefits. Did you hear me? YOU CAN'T CHANGE YOUR ADDRESS IF YOU'RE NOT RECEIVING BENEFITS.
- The recording SAYS you can say the word "question" at any time if you are confused. I literally YELLED the word "QUESTION" about 20 times and absolutely nothing happened. I'm pretty sure Ashton Kutcher Punk'd me on that one. Pretty funny, jerk. 
- Not one time was I offered the option of changing an address for a spouse. Don't assume the spouses are all dead, although many may have expired during their time on this stupid automated menu.
- Automated phone systems think that you're an idiot. They are the idiots.

I was more than happy (OK, not really, but let's pretend) to do this on my parents' behalf. All I could think about while making these maddening phone calls was how frustrating it would be to try and do this if you're elderly, visually impaired or having trouble hearing. They worked all their lives to qualify for these benefits. Many of those in this "Greatest Generation" risked life and limb to protect our great nation, only to be confused and angered by an overly friendly computer voice offering almost no help at all.

How did we get to this?