Lots Of Pain For No Gain

An Op Ed piece appearing in the Los Angeles Times, written by Michael Astrue, Commissioner of Social Security, and Yvonne Walker, president of The Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which represents employees of the California Disability Determination Services Department:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger may have a cameo role in a current film, but the real "Expendables" appear to be disabled Californians, the state employees who make disability decisions for the Social Security Administration and the federal dollars he is throwing away. Long before he was governor, bodybuilder Schwarzenegger lived by the motto "No pain, no gain." However, as California's chief executive, his policy of furloughing even those state employees whose salaries are federally funded has given rise to a new axiom: "Lots of pain for no gain."

Social Security pays 100% of the salaries and overhead for workers in California's Disability Determination Services Division (DDSD) — bringing in more than $211 million a year to the state. These employees make medical determinations for Social Security payments. As a direct result of their work, each month Social Security pays $1.3 billion in disability benefits to more than 1.3 million California residents.

Furloughing DDSD employees does not save California a single penny. It has done nothing to reduce the $19-billion general fund deficit. Instead, the state loses the federal funds allocated for the DDSD. Most tragically, it imposes a financial burden on California's disabled citizens by delaying millions of dollars in federal disability benefits and medical coverage to those in need.

To meet the needs of California residents, the Social Security Administration is redirecting thousands of backlogged California cases to Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas. The cost of processing such cases will total millions of dollars — federal dollars that would have gone to California, had the governor chosen to exempt the DDSD workers from furloughs.