The paper provides an independent evaluation of the SIPP Synthetic Beta File. This file, created by the Bureau of the Census, is intended to provide a public use database with similar statistical properties as the confidential Social Security Administration's earnings and benefit data linked to the SIPP. There is much to praise in the Census work. Many univariate distributions were "spot on." Unweighted regression analyses had some problems and results for them were mixed. In policy simulation modeling there were many instances of differences between the Synthetic and actual data that would have led researchers to wrong conclusions.