On April 15, 1987, seven million American children disappeared overnight. This was the day the Internal Revenue Service changed a rule. Thenceforth, all dependent children were no longer to be listed on tax forms merely by name, but a Social Security number must be provided for each. Seven million children that existed only on paper the previous year disappeared on April 15th, tax day. At the time, that represented about one tenth of all dependent children in the United States.