Courtesy of the National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) here are some numbers on backlogs at the Disability Determination Services (DDS) which make decisions at the initial and reconsideration levels on Social Security disability claims. The increases in receipts and backlogs are startling. I cannot understand the dramatic differences in new receipts between the states. Certainly, differences in unemployment rates do not explain what is going on.
3 comments:
Well, it is not just unemployment rates. This increase is impacted by the aging of the boomer generation. It is also (at least in Ohio and some other states) going to be impacted by furloughs mandated by governors of those States which includes DDS employees even though DDS operations are fully Federally funded. DDSs are not now able to keep up despite ongoing overtime. This situation is going to get worse in Ohio and many other States over the next 2 years.
this information can be misleading....it is the number of cases pending and done in a state DDS. Some states are getting help from SSA offices and other states and those cases are diverted to - and reported in those SSA offices and other DDSs.
The reason for the increases could very well be multifactorial in nature. Unemployment, aging, varying eligibility factors, and availability of other programs probably contribute to the increase in new claims. Pendings might vary due to overtime availability, furloughs, workload shifts, et cetera. Along with a recent push over the last year or so for the DDS's to at least address Social Security's rulings regarding medical source opinions and credibility of symptom-related limitations in decisionmaking, which simply results in less productivity compared to the formulaic decisions that often had to be resorted to in order to keep up with past workloads.
My understanding is that most states do not want to divert initial claims for various reasons and in some instances may not be able to, which then wouldn't be incorrectly reflected in those numbers. In any case I'd say those listed backlogs are pretty consistent with observed reality. There are simply more claims coming in than people and time to handle them.
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