The Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS), a federal agency that does legal research and makes recommendations for federal agencies, has released A Study of Social Security Litigation in the Federal Courts. Here are a few excerpts (footnotes omitted):
- This investigation revealed one obvious fact: federal judges know little about the path social security claims follow from initial filing to their chambers.
- District and magistrate judges tend to march in lockstep within districts. Districts with one judge who remands a lot of cases to the agency tend to have other judges who do so as well. Very few individual judges have decision patterns that depart significantly from what their district colleagues produce.
- Circuit boundaries are associated with a good deal of district-level variation. For example, the fact that the Eastern District of New York remands more cases than the Southern District of Florida seems to be significantly related to the fact that, over all, districts in the Second Circuit remand a greater share of cases than do districts in the Eleventh Circuit.
- A number of factors – judicial ideology, the degree of a district’s urbanization, the assignment of cases to district versus magistrate judges, ALJ [Administrative Law Judge] case loads, and others – have little association with case outcomes.
- Most of the twenty-four ALJs we interviewed subscribe to what one labeled a “just in time” approach to case review. An ALJ using this method first looks at a case anywhere from one day to a week before the hearing.
- The agency can always appeal the district court’s decision, but it almost never does so. The courts of appeals might receive somewhere in the neighborhood of 650 social security appeals each year, no more than twenty of which are affirmative appeals by the Commissioner. In FY [Fiscal Year] 2014, the agency filed exactly one appeal. Several reasons might explain this low incidence of appeal, but one institutional fact is surely important: the Solicitor General of the United States must sign off on any appeal the SSA [Social Security Administration] might want to take.
- The hearing office that we studied in the low remand district came off as a model of institutional health. “I can’t begin to think of a better place to work,” one decision writer told us. The office has stable management, with a long serving Hearing Office Chief Administrative Law Judge (“HOCALJ”), and ALJs tend to stay once they are assigned there.
- Most of the hearing office personnel from the high remand district described a very different and more problematic work environment. Several ALJs complained of poor quality decision writing, and several expressed a preference for decisions written off-site in national case assistance centers. An ALJ described unstable, volatile management at a hearing office for much of the past decade, and ALJs and a claimant representative complained of the office’s capacity to perform basic administrative tasks. Some personnel described communication difficulties between ALJs and decision writers.
- Recommendation 1. Congress should give the Social Security Administration independent litigating authority.
- Recommendation 2. Congress should enact enabling legislation to clarify the U.S. Supreme Court’s authority to promulgate procedural rules for social security litigation. The Judicial Conference should authorize the appointment of a social security rules advisory committee, and the U.S. Supreme Court should approve a set of social security rules drafted by this committee.
- Recommendation 3. A uniform set of procedural rules for social security litigation should contain (a) a rule requiring the claimant to file a notice of appeal instead of a complaint; (b) a rule requiring the agency to file the certified administrative record instead of an answer; (c) a rule requiring the parties to exchange merits briefs instead of motions; (d) a rule setting appropriate deadlines and page limits; and (e) a rule creating a presumption against oral argument.
- Recommendation 4. The Administrative Office of the United States Courts, the Federal Judicial Center, the Administrative Conference of the United States, and the Social Security Administration should cooperate on several initiatives to improve communication among the agency, claimant representatives, and the judiciary, and to educate the judiciary in important aspects of the claims adjudication process. These initiatives should include the creation of social security standing committees for each district and the drafting of an introductory manual on social security law and processes.
- Recommendation 5. Congress should not replace the existing system of judicial review with a specialized court for social security appeals. The Appeals Council should issue opinions in a set of appeals each year that will benefit from Chevron deference and thereby reduce circuit-level variation.
- Suggestion 1. The agency should investigate further the relationship between hearing office performance and work environment, on one hand, and remand rates in district courts, on the other.
- Suggestion 2. The agency should add bottom-up, localized experiments to their quality assurance initiatives. This experimentation could include a pilot project in several hearing offices that uses district court decisions for guidance and critique.
- Suggestion 3. The Social Security Administration and the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts should provide the federal judiciary with a database listing district and magistrate judge decision rates.
- Suggestion 4. The Social Security Administration should attempt to quantify the “false positive phenomenon,” or the number of court remands that, once adjudicated again, do not result in the payment of benefits.
- Suggestion 5. To the extent possible, the Social Security Administration should require that hearing offices assign court remands to the same decision writers who worked on the cases the first time.
- Suggestion 6. The Social Security Administration should study the issue of an OGC [Office of General Counsel] attorney’s ethical obligations and, where appropriate, provide clearer guidance.
- We nonetheless believe that only a dramatic reduction in ALJ caseloads could permit significant, across-the-board improvements in decision-making quality sufficient to cause the federal court remand rate to plummet sharply. To avoid a spike in the backlog of claims, the size of the ALJ corps would have to increase. Ultimately, this may be the most important reform of all.
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we need more people at ODAR--full stop. If you want decent quality decisions and ALJs that can carefully consider a claim and issue a proper, complete, good decision, that simply cannot happen in a system where each judge is expected to issue 500 dispositions a year. Even if 100 are dismissals, 400 substantive decisions is more than one per calendar day! How could we ever have thought this possible in the first place? We've got nearly the same ratios of ALJs, staff, etc. from the days when a much smaller percentage of the population filed disability claims, and technology has not (and never will be despite what Silicon Valley types may say!) created some huge windfall of productivity.
ReplyDeleteIt's just like Astrue said--you want more work done? Give me more employees.
@11:02
ReplyDeleteI fully agree. What is most needed at ODAR is good support staff, rather than constantly moving these employees up and trying to turn them into attorneys. Thankfully, assertions on this board indicate this is going to stop.
In addition, ODAR should not require Attorney decision writer's to persistently type their own decisions all day, everyday on a sustained basis. Not all Attorneys are speedy typists, but have much to offer from a legal standpoint. So how about providing support staff in the form of typists to type dictation from Attorneys who prefer to verbally transcribe their work and have a typist type their dictation? Those Attorneys who wish to type their work, may continue to do so. I do not want to hear anything about Dragon Naturally Speaking. I have never been able to get the program to type more than a couple words correctly, let alone denial decisions which can run into the 25+ page range with reference to some medical and legal terms.
Personally, I was able to accomplish so much more production wise with verbal transcription and a typist. The difference was phenomenal. So, the pertinent question is do you want to pay Attorneys to type, or for their legal skills?
The same is true with ALJ's and their decision writing instructions. The Agency has gone overboard where this is concerned. Attorney decision writer's do not require a book of instructions, although non-attorney writer's do. Frankly, I was got along well with legible handwriten writing instructions, which just had the basics in terms of what the ALJ wants.
It's not as though Attorneys and ALJ's cannot use a computer, it's about how much typing slows some of them down. I think the Agency erred when it decided to do away with typing and secretarial support with the implementation of HPI in the year 2000, and move employees from those jobs up through the ranks to decision writer making the same salaries, often more due to seniority, than Attorneys. We need to regain some of this support staff. At the end of the day, it's about how to perform the highest quality of work in the most productive manner, and some Attorney's and ALJ's would be more productive with typists/secretarial support staff, while others prefer to do their own. Let's relax on having everything but the kitchen sink in decisions and writing instructions, and obtain some typist/secretarial support for those of us who want it.
I like where you're going, but you'd have to show some pretty huge gains in writing speed to justify hiring typists or repurposing existing support staff significantly. Since most support staff nowadays are SCTs with very few CTs, that means it will be mostly SCTs doing the transcription. Thus, pulling and assisting with ALJ workloads would suffer. Can an attorney be so much more productive that it is worth the cost of a full-time support person processing dictation for x number of attorneys on a full-time basis? He could, but I imagine the increased productivity would have to be much greater than anyone could assume would occur.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I don't see a job that is mostly or even significantly so rudimentary as listening to tape and typing decisions being graded very highly or viewed well by our current DC, et al. They already don't like how low-grade most ODAR jobs are in the first place, the last thing they want to do is add a bunch of GS-3 or 4 level work to the mix.
Much to digest. Very good summary.
ReplyDeleteBottom line is money. SSA is not funded properly even though FICA taxes should bring in enough money to do this. The Repubs in Congress simply do not fund SSA properly.
This is one of the reasons I would not be an ALJ. Too much bureaucracy. Too little support.
@2:41,
ReplyDeleteIn my heyday,with verbal transcription and a typist, it was not uncommon for me to write two affirmations and a reversal in a days time. Being required to persistently type the decisions I write, this takes about a week, more or less. You do the math. My stats between verbal transcription with a typist verses Typing all of my work would knock your socks off.
As for support staff I do not buy your argument about the folks in DC only desire hiring for higher grade jobs. We did this with OHA for years, and it can and should be done now.
This alleged desire to only hire for higher grade positions is the very same illogical thinking which created HPI, which was all about creating great jobs for non-attorneys through the entire chain of command to the top of the Ivory Tower. HPI has caused us to be top heavy with far too many non-attorneys in management positions. We are a Hearings Office and we must be managed by attorneys, especially those with substantial experience in the field hearing offices
Hey, I'm all in with no paralegals period and no non-attorneys running the law side of things, but that is separate and apart from the abysmally low grades of most jobs in the ODAR field and the desire to not have most employees trapped at GS-6 or 8.
ReplyDelete@4:04
ReplyDeleteWe had typists and secretarial support when we were OHA, why can't it be done now? Typists in the OHA structure gradually moved up through the ranks to Hearing Assistant, comparable to today's SCT position. The problem began when these individuals were groomed to be attorneys and moved up to decision writer and management positions.
The bottom line is we need the typist and secretarial support we had when we were OHA. I do not know what can be further said about grade levels for these jobs other than to look what was done when we were OHA; reform of the civil service system which addresses these lower paying entry level support staff positions; or simply recognize these jobs are what they are, and many are willing to perform them, until they further their education.
We really need these support staff positions, and surely, something can be worked out.
lol typist are so far out of the question it isn't even funny. If you can't type the job isn't for you. get out. You sounds like a queen typing is not beneath you. 2 unfavorable and a favorable per week is really slow you're basically saying it takes you 2 days to write an unfavorable that's slow. Especially for someone with significant experience. Your speed should increase over time.
ReplyDeleteODAR has shifted from handwritten instructions with basics. Now, ALJs are trained to do their job, put everything needed for the decisions in instructions severe imp, rfc, weight assigned to every opinion etc. Writers just plug and play into a FIT template and fill in some blanks, its not hard. With detailed instructions, writers are basically typists.
ODAR is never going to get significantly more money no one cares about disabled people until they themselves become disabled. Moreover, people who apply for disability are poor and powerless. A persistent backlog reinforces the right's narrative that they want, government is incompetent. This situation is pretty much par for the course from here out. Serious reductions in the backlog will only be achieved through automation and systems.
Almost every ACUS report I've seen says throw more money at it. Which, when assigned to fix a problem in government, is essentially a punt.
Hire loads of ALJs, they make a decision, enter impairments, RFC, weight, etc. into EBB. A program reads the evidence and spits out a decision. ALJ reviews it, signs it. Watson won Jeopardy, it can be done. It would be best for the country if my job became automated in the coming years. It certainly looks like its headed that way.
@4:23
ReplyDeleteIt is not necessary to attack, "lol" me, or inform me what ODAR no longer does or does not do concerning handwritten v. typed decision writing instructions. If you had read what I actually said about handwritten instructions, I was informing TPTB they should go back to allowing the ALJ's to do that, if they, desire, and not to require everything but the kitchen sink in decision writing instructions or decisions. My thinking is the current requirements are needlessly slowing down production. The same is true with decision writing using typist v. persistently typing all of ones work. Not every Attorney decision writer is a speedy typist. The stats I quoted are true concerning me personally. And, no, I do not think I should be thrown to the curb because I cannot type speedily all day, everyday, on a sustained basis. Look at the quality and production I had over 12 consecutive years. Yet, the Agency did not reward me. The rest of my story is well known, and for the record, I am not "old age."
The quality of your writing in your comment compared to what I produced for many, many years for ODAR, leaves something to be desired, and that is putting it nicely. For heaven's sake, you carry on as though I have no knowledge of FIT or EBB. Where do you think I have been? You also insinuate the quality of the work during my heydey was not s good, or the ALJ's not well informed. There's very little difference. In fact, we did not have outlier ALJ's who denied everything like I have witnessed the past few years.
Before you comment in the future, I suggest you present yourself as a human being rather than an idiot.
Oh please its stream of thought posted from a cell phone. I know you've been around I'm just arguing why its better now. Your essentially saying you need 2 employees to produce the work one should. Requiring judges to out more instructions speeds up writing and allows work to be shifted around the country more easily, but you know that. Its a widget factory. The AC standards aren't high. We aren't writing law review notes.
ReplyDelete@5:48
ReplyDeleteNo, I am not saying 2 employees are required to perform Attorney decision writing in the manner I excelled. When one looks at the outstanding production I produced in said manner, the typist I'd more than paid for. Why not utilize my time for my Attorney knowledge, rather than persistent typing? It makes a lot of sense for people like me. One days worth of work verses what takes me a week.
Your argument we're not writing Law Review articles was true during my heyday, but lately, there has been so much emphasis on overly detailed decision writing instructions, and throwing everything but the kitchen sink in decisions, it has detrimentally and unnecessarily slowed production. Moreover, experienced Attorney decision writer's do not require a book of instructions. I much prefer less over a detailed book of instructions, which does nothing more than bog me down. I do not think TPTB have made wise choices as of late in terms of what works and is most effective in getting the bottom line (decisions) out. They have been coming across as too rigid and obstinate, and unwilling to recognize that every Attorney fits into the same mold, e.g., what works for me and leads to phenomenal production and what works for you and others could not coexist. Just saying ...
The recommendations are sensible, and some are even brilliantly innovative. 2 problems: they ignore the root cause of SSA's issues and they look at things from a standard lawyer's perspective.
ReplyDeleteWith all due respect, the way in which SSA admin law exists is so far removed from the context of a typical attorney's education that, shockingly, many of the best advocates claimant's side and best innovators on ODAR's side are *gasp* non-attorneys!
I know because I see this ever day in the San Francisco, Oakland, San Rafael, San Jose, Stockton, and Sacramento ODARs. And I've seen the worst case scenarios in the further flung ODARs like Billings, Harrison, San Antonio, and Albuquerque.
But still, this report is a step in the right direction.
423, tell us pray tell how many world class decisions do you currently write per day? Have you ever even written a decision and I don't mean dismissals. I bet not.
ReplyDelete820 you sound suspiciously like 423, bash attorneys and try to sound like you are more important than you really are
You both must be disgruntled non-attorneys passed over for any meaningful work and trolls with nothing ever constructive to say
and by the way 423 let go of "lol", it belies your pathetic attempt to remain relevant I will apologize for my snarkiness but it was warranted
thank goodness for the attorneys inside and out, because otherwise BHA/OHA/ODAR/OSHIT would be no better than a private insurer
"Most of the twenty-four ALJs we interviewed subscribe to what one labeled a “just in time” approach to case review. An ALJ using this method first looks at a case anywhere from one day to a week before the hearing."
ReplyDeleteI don't fault ALJs for that as the work load likely accounts for it. The implications though, are significant. It means claimants are not really getting any meaningful and specific notice of issues before their hearings because ALJs are not even looking at the files for the first time before the hearing notices go out. Also, it's unlikely that on the record decision requests are getting timely attention before the "just in time" ALJs. Those cannot help but be major contributors to hearing delays and backlogs.
First, to the person who wants to bring back typists...dream on.
ReplyDelete1. When we can't get budgets to fill staff jobs at all, they're certainly not going to reassign people to that task.
2. Show some adaptability. Make an effort to streamline the process. I'm a terribly slow typist, but I soon found I actually finished my decisions faster when I stopped dictating. Of course I developed a large library of macros, templates, and special purpose files to speed up the process and eliminate the painful editing of those drafts the typists provided. Maybe your typists were wonderful, but many of mine were miserable.
So I guess some poor soldier is typing in the genius's recorded statements above who thinks SSA should bring back typists? That is a sure fix - real innovation, brilliant. Maybe SSA could also hire someone to print out the claimant's electronic files for this same individual. Rocket science at its finest.
ReplyDelete@8:56 & 9:29
ReplyDeleteI want to bring back typists and secretarial support for those who want and need it. I have severe DDD of cervical spine with radiculopathy and myelopathy in upper extremities, 3 fused discs with a 4th herniated disc on top of them, arthritis in hands and shoulders, CTS, among other things. Don't think all these years of persistent typing all day, everyday, on a sustained basis did not cause and/or significantly contribute to this? Think again. So, you do not think you will develop these types of conditions after years of persistent, nonstop typing and computer use? Think again. Moreover, I indicated in my initial comment there will be some people who prefer to do their own work and some like me who are clearly a million times more productive with a typist and verbal transcription. Why can't the two coexist?
In addition, it should not be beneath current support staff, CT's and SCT's to provide typing and secretarial support as needed. Former Hearing Clerks and Hearing Assistants did when we were OHA.
The problem HPI created is it raised such unrealistic advancement for non-attorneys that these individuals believe typing and secretarial work is beneath them. This is ridiculous. If they want to further their education, there are plenty of colleges and universities everywhere. It was idiotic to think you could groom these individuals to be attorneys and high level management officials. This is why we are in the state of disaster we are, and going no where because the non-attorneys controlling the wheel of the ship are clueless about how to manage a Hearings Office and organization full of judges and attorneys.
Your attacks on me and the comments I made are petty, immature and unwarranted. Ask the ALJ's, Agency Attorneys and Attorneys who represent claimants on this board whether they prefer the professionalism and decades of experience I provide, or what you have to offer based on your comments, level of education and experience. I already know the answer, and it does not point to you.
@8:56,
ReplyDelete10:16 here. Your remarks about how you developed a bunch of macros, templates and special purpose files when you wrote and typed your decisions to streamline the process is duly noted. I did too, although probably not to the extent you did. You know what. All of those macros, templates and special files you used to insert ib decisions before you became an ALJ (presumably), came back on remand because they were NOT considered legally sufficient. I know personally, because I rewrote those remanded decisions. If you think I am wrong, then check your stats. So shut up already and get off your high horse.
@6:27 AM
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't worry that much. More than just the ALJ is looking at the file before hearing. If you did your job right as a rep, that OTR you send into an e-file will automatically generate a to-do item to someone that an OTR has been requested and they will assign it out to a Senior Attorney or the assigned ALJ for review. Similarly, most SCTs and clerk CTs are very adept at noticing earnings, possible OTR, etc. issues while working up, developing, and otherwise working with files before (and after) hearing.
@11:15 PM
ReplyDelete8:20 here. I'm definitely not the person @ 4:23. I also don't work for SSA. I'm actually a Binder non-attorney rep, moving on to a new position with State of CA soon, so I feel more comfortable commenting here as opposed to just lurking as I typically did.
That said, I'm not trying to bash attorneys. I'm trying to bash the idea that SSA admin law is anything like the kind of law in any other arena. Because it isn't. It doesn't make sense in the real world or even a real legal world. It's this small pocket universe of admin law where up can be sideways, where surveillance systems monitor jobs still exist, and where fibromyalgia apparently isn't a real disease. It's a place where many attorneys go to die a slow death and even the best law school training cannot help or prepare you for what the day=to-day work of this practice entails.
As for constructive criticism... did you read my comment? I actually think the suggestions/recommendations provided by the report are GOOD. I think they're going in the right direction. I have some issues with their perspective, but they proposed some great things and I said as much.
So, please, read for clarity and comprehension rather than imagining there are trolls around every bend.
Also, I would note that, based on the thousands of cases I've worked (and the thousands of cases my colleagues have worked I might add) that private insurers are actually EASIER to get paid disability from than SSA. (Not that I want them to actually privatize SSA, for obvious reasons.) I could only WISH the Agency had the same resources, standards, and methods as some of these private long-term disability insurers. Maybe then I wouldn't see a younger individual literally in a wheelchair after being hit by a car get denied benefits after waiting 2 years for a hearing and 6 months for a decision by an ALJ barely 6 months out at an ODAR doing hearings whose own clerk says reviews cases just 1 day prior to the hearing. Because, apparently, the regs on accommodations and VE testimony don't apply when you don't want them to apply, especially when you've got a backlog, have never worked client or claimant side in your legal life, as well as oh yeah, they're Black, female, and poor, so might as well hold them in suspicion for that too.
Again, I stand by my previous comment.
Well 8:44 then I stand corrected in regards to you being the same as 423 however I have to say as to your analysis otherwise I definitely disagree with you. yes things are definitely wonky at SSA and it is unlike any other practice of law but it is the practice of law I'm also sorry to say that the non-attorney Reps that I have seen have done a really poor job not that all attorneys do a good job because I'm not implying that but I can honestly say I don't think I've ever seen a non-attorney rep do a good job as for insurance companies being easier to get a claim settled I'm really not sure what you're talking about because all the pi cases that I've been involved with took quite a while to settle and I'm talking years we will just have to agree to disagree
ReplyDeleteThis was done on my dumb phone so I apologize for any mistakes
It's not that typing or whatever is beneath SCTs and CTs, it's that we don't have the employees we need to do crucial workloads (like working up cases to that ALJs have cases to hear, decide, etc.) and have leftover manpower to allow them to spend significant time typing out dictation, etc. Just like we don't have $ to hire people to type out dictation. We are on a hiring freeze, we still are bleeding employees to retirement, and yet we are hiring ALJs like it's going out of style. Not. Enough. Bodies. Period.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete@3:02,
ReplyDeleteI respectfully disagree. ODAR took all of the typists when HPI began in the year 2000 and moved them up through the ranks from CT, to SCT, to Paralegal Specialist (GS-11/12 job), to Group Supervisor (GS-13 management job), and even the HOD position (GS-14 management job). Within a couple of years, I (Senior Attorney) was training typists who once typed my dictation, some with not more than high school diplomas, to write decisions. Do you have any idea of the countless, pointless hours I, and other Senior Attorneys, spent trying to mold these individuals into Attorney decision writers, when our time could have been much better spent doing Senior Attorney work? The answer: An ungodly, ridiculous amount of time wasted. The Agency even paid for expensive trips to Falls Church and Washington, D.C., so SA's could teach 2-week writing classes to non-attorneys. Money well spent: No. The HPI bureaucracy top heavy with non-attorney managers and high level officials who made and continue to make these nonsensical decisions responsible: You bet.
So, when you give the argument you do not have the people, my question to you is where are all those you promoted over the past 16 years? I personally know they have not all retired. Moreover, since Hearing Clerks (now CT's) and Hearing Assistants (now SCT's) in the pre-HPI bureaucracy when ODAR was known as OHA typed dictated decisions, and other things, and performed secretarial work when needed, why can't they now? They did it then, and we had just as many issues with time needed to work up cases for ALJ's, backlogs, etc. The bottom line: I do not buy your assertions. Even if one buys your assertions, then why can't ODAR hire contract typists based on need? Contract typists would not be costly, or an undue burden, to the Agency. Until I was illegally forced out, I personally observed a purveying attitude among CT's, SCT's, and other support staffers in ODAR that typing and secretarial work was, indeed, beneath them.
An argument raised in a previous post that ODAR does not want to hire people for lower paying jobs, such as typists and secretarial staff, because they are trying to raise salaries of their employees, begs the question: Why have many recent studies about the salaries of Federal employees consistently revealed that it is those in professional positions which require advanced college degrees, such as Attorneys, whose salaries are not competitive with the private sector, while those Federal employees who occupy lower level jobs tend to be paid far more than comparable employees in the private sector?
In addition @3:02, are you really losing people due to actual, real Retirement, or those, like me, whom you illegally forced out into an involuntary Retirement? Curious minds want to know. The most recent statistics concerning retirement of baby boomer Federal employees is there has NOT been the mass exodus of retirements by these individuals as was initially anticipated.
Things are different now and you know it. Long gone are the days (we have Hyatt here, so I have seen plenty of decisions from the 1980s and early 1990s) where decisions were two or three pages TOTAL (without so much as articulating the specific limitations in the RFC) and most decision writers can draft 2+ decisions a day. The agency cares more about quality now. Also, relative to the number of employees we have, the number of disability apps filed/pending is much higher ratio-wise than it ever was a few decades back. If SSA's number of employees relative to either the US population generally or the number of claims/pieces of work we have to do, we would have easily 10,000+ more employees.
ReplyDeleteWe don't have enough employees to do enough work at the level of quality it requires. Full stop. There is no time for SCTs and CTs to be typing dictation when we barely have enough of them to take care of hearings and work up cases.
Why is this so hard to understand?? SSA--all of it-- has 60-someodd thousand employees and an operating budget just north of $12 billion. We paid nearly $1 trillion in benefits in FY 2015, handled 37 million phone calls at call centers and nearly 70 million more at FOs/DOs, had over 40 million appointments at DOs/FOs, completed 8 million claims for benefits, issued more than 600,000 hearing decisions and dismissals, completed just shy of 800,000 medical CDRs, etc. etc.
To put that in perspective, UnitedHealth Group, one of the US' largest insurers/healthcare companies had an operating budget just north of $11 billion for 2015. They have 200,000 employees (!!!). They do far fewer things than SSA does and serve far fewer people. They don't move nearly the amount of money we do (we paid more in benefits in three months than their total revenues for 2015).
If a private company did anything remotely resembling what SSA does, they would demand a workforce north of 250,000 employees and have an operating budget approaching $100 billion. Yes, we have tons of problems and all of that, but cheese and rice, considering what and how much we do relative to our budget and employees, it is nothing short of a miracle that we do what we do.
@9:11,
ReplyDeleteNo,things are NOT different now. I can personally attest because I was there. YOU WERE NOT, BECAUSE YOU ARE BASING YOUR ASSERTIONS ON A FEW HYATT DECISIONS YOU ALLEGEDLY READ, WHICH YOU DO NOT BELIEVE ARE AS GOOD AS YOURS ARE TODAY. BIG DEAL!
Your continued bashing of the work of your fellow Attorney decision writer predecessors, many of whom are now ALJ's you may be writing decisions for, reveals you are exceedingly insecure, unprofessional, immature and in no way espouse the degree of professionalism, skills, or abilities of those colleagues who preceded you.
TO THE CONTRARY, YOU ARE AN IDIOT AND A JERK UNWORTHY OF WORKING FOR SSA/ODAR.
The ONLY thing which is different now is you have non-attorneys in all levels of management through the entire chain of command who are clueless. It is their incompetence and refusal to admit it, which has all but driven the Agency into ground it is presently.
If you do not have anything substantive to contribute beyond bashing your colleagues who preceded you, then shut up already, you INSECURE JERK.
Hey Chuckles, can you go ahead and just IP ban 27 year SAA? She's a real bummer and everyone's tired of her tired spiel.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete@12:03,
ReplyDeleteWell, if it isn't the North Carolina strawman from the previous August 4, thread, "Going to Hell in a Handbasket," who made an absolute fool of himself then by asking Charles to ban me. Didn't get enough, huh? Want to more fully establish yourself as a fool, so you came back. Isn't that cute?
What's the matter? Am I SA 27 getting underneath your skin? Is the kitchen getting too hot?
I have news for you. Things are going to come out in the news in the not too distant future, which will make assertions I have made seem like playtime in pre-school.
I'm good, SA 27. I still have my job and the agency thinks I'm great ;)
ReplyDelete@1:19, et. al.,
ReplyDeleteATTENTION CHARLES AND ALL READERS/COMMENTERS:
I WANT EVERYONE TO KNOW THE ONLY REASON NORTH CAROLINA STRAWMAN IS "GOOD" IS BECAUSE HE TRICKED ME BY DIRECTLY EMAILING ME HIS COMMENTS AT 12:20 & 12:33, AUGUST 24, 2016, (SEE WITHDRAWN COMMENTS JUST ABOVE). I RESPONDED TO HIS EMAILS BY CLICKING REPLY, THINKING MY COMMENTS WOULD SIMPLY BE POSTED AS USUAL. I WITHDREW MY RESPONSES AFTER I WENT TO THE ACTUAL WEBSITE, AND REALIZED HIS HAD NEVER BEEN POSTED. IN SO DOING, HE WAS ABLE TO OBTAIN MY IDENTITY AND EMAIL ADDRESS. I DID NOT REALIZE THIS WAS EVEN POSSIBLE.
THEREFORE, NORTH CAROLINA STRAWMAN IS AN ACTUAL DIRTY, CORRUPT ODAR/SSA MANAGEMENT STRAWMAN HERE TO OBTAIN INFORMATION AS TO MY SPECIFIC IDENTITY AND EMAIL ADDRESS, SO HE AND HIS MINIONS CAN CRIMINALLY HARASS, TERRORIZE, STALK, AND INTIMIDATE ME, AS THEY HAVE DONE IN THE PAST, UNTIL LAW ENFORCEMENT GOT INVOLVED, E.G., MY OFFICE AND HOME COMPUTERS HACKED, FRAUDULENT CHARGES MADE TO BANK
ACCOUNT INFORMATION THEY OBTAINED, PROPERTY DAMAGED, UTILITIES AT MY HOME VANDALIZED AND POWER CUT ON A COLD DECEMBER NIGHT, AND THE LIST GOES ON AND ON. I CAN ASSURE YOU THE CRIMINAL HARASSMENT THESE INDIVIDUALS SUBJECTED ME TO WOULD SHOCK YOUR CONSCIENCE.
I AM NOTIFYING ALL FEDERAL, STATE AND LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT ABOUT THIS. THUS, ANY FORM OF HARASSMENT, TERRORIZING, STALKING, INTIMIDATION AND RETALIATION TAKEN PERTAINING TO MY AGENCY EMPLOYMENT AND BENEFITS WILL BE AGGRESSIVELY ADDRESSED BY LAW ENFORCEMENT.
I WANT EVERYONE HERE TO KNOW THE TRUTH ABOUT THE DEGREE OF DIRT AND CORRUPTION WHICH EXISTS AMONG ODAR/SSA's HIGHEST MANAGEMENT OFFICIALS, AND THE ILLEGAL CRIMINAL TACTICS THEY RESORT TO SHOULD ANYONE TRY TO EXPOSE THEM. IF ANYONE SHOULD BE BANNED BY CHARLES, IT CERTAINLY IS NOT ME. FURTHER, I WILL NOT BE SILENCED BY YOUR CRIMINAL HARASSMENT, TERRORIZING, INTIMIDATION OR RETALIATION.