A plan afoot in Congress to halt illegal immigration would prove a headache for employers.

The country's employers, all 7.4 million of them, would be required to submit Social Security numbers for new employees, now numbering about 55 million each year, according to McClatchy Newspapers.

Federal employees would then check the numbers using an electronic database.

The purpose would be to detect any workers who landed their jobs using false Social Security numbers.

Some 32 members of the House of Representatives are promoting the system.

But employers do not need this added bit of paperwork. Nor does the Social Security Administration, which would be diverted from its work.

"Disability cases are piling up, and needy people are waiting years to receive their benefits," said Barbara Kennelly, president and chief executive officer of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare. It would also cost $10 billion over nine years — 10 percent of the agency's administrative budget, she said in testimony before the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Social Security last week.

It would drive illegal immigrants to the underground economy to avoid detection. This is no solution.