Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

From the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (emphasis in original):

Three years ago, the Social Security Administration’s Atlanta offices had the nation’s worst backlog of pending disability cases. Some very sick people, who initially had been turned down for Social Security benefits and were awaiting appeals, were losing their homes, or even dying, before getting a cent. ...

But these days, the average wait time to get an appeal hearing has been cut by more than half. The Social Security Administration has hired more staff; opened its third hearing office in the Atlanta area, in Covington; and overhauled its operations here and around the country. ...

Social Security’s downtown Atlanta office now takes 366 days on average to resolve a claim, down from 900 days — almost 2 1/2 years — in 2007, when it often had the worst turnaround time in the nation. It’s now in the middle of the pack among Social Security’s hearing offices. ...

But such numbers only count the time people spend waiting for a hearing, and don’t count several months that most cases spend in the initial phases. ...

In Georgia, the average time at the initial stages jumped from about 86 days in 2007 to 141 days this year — now a month longer than the national average. The Social Security Administration is shifting cases to other states to catch up.