From The Week:
On Jan. 23, President Trump signed an executive order instituting a 90-day federal hiring freeze, as the first step in a "long-term plan" to cut the federal workforce. It's unclear how far along that plan is, but 79 days into his presidency, the effects of Trump's freeze are already being felt at government agencies like the Social Security Administration, the Veterans Affairs Department, and the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday — and the public is starting to feel the reduced staffing levels, too. ...
At the Social Security Administration, an inability to replace the workforce after departures, combined with a rise in claims as baby boomers retire, has led to longer lines at offices and on the phone. "The agency is doing things they never did before, like sending people home without any service," Witold Skwierczynski, president of a union that represents 25,000 Social Security employees, tells The Wall Street Journal. "You can't just establish a hiring freeze and expect us to continue to do all our work." ...
Witold S. should know better than to say offices have never sent people home without any service. In large metro offices lines have been cut off at certain busy days/times for many years based on traffic and staffing. We can agree that it is becoming routine now however. There was a defacto freeze under Pres Obama well before the exec order that has not gotten much attention. Will a new commissioner burn the village to save it?
ReplyDeleteEven with a freeze, the training is longer than 79 days anyway. All of this would of happened regardless of a freeze or not.
ReplyDeleteHow many years have we been under a hiring freeze? We haven't hired any staff in several years...
ReplyDeleteDidn't we have a fill in Commish say, "We have been doing more with less and now we will be doing less with less."
ReplyDeleteThe beauty of it is that we will soon be doing everything with nothing....
ReplyDeleteIf it has to become as such, then hopefully, the Agency will start to treat its minicule Minority employees' population (Muslims, South Asians, Asian-Americans, Native Americans) a bit better than the B.S. glass-ceiling and constant inequalities in treatment that have been used against these people for a such damn long time because of their lack of vocal voices !!!
ReplyDeleteAs an enthusiast learner of other cultures and especially the Far East, I am appalled that there are anti-Asian and foreig-born of any kind at our Agency!! I hope the leadership would fix it soon because we do not deserve these kind of negative and uncalled for images within this agency.
ReplyDelete6:31 PM, perhaps it isn't because of a lack of local voices, perhaps it is because they don't speak English. When I work in an office that is 80% minorities, with all management that are minorities and yet the general population is still a majority of whites, I must wonder exactly what you are talking about?
ReplyDeleteThere was a post on this board from a while back that showed the data for all manner of minority/gender/etc. hiring, management, etc. Those data showed that SSA has disproportionately high representation, from the bottom to the highest grades, for every single minority group (women aren't a minority, but it includes them, too) save for the disabled. We have a problem with treating the disabled fairly, but the data shows we are doing more than fine on race, age, and gender.
ReplyDeleteThe last top two posts are 2 ignorant idiots working for S
ReplyDelete@10:13
DeleteIn what ways are those two posts "Ignorant?" I believe they, and specifically, 5:39, are spot-on. I recall the previous post on this blog 5:39 referenced, and those statistics are correct.
It certainly seems that before you refer to the two commenters before you as, "2 Ignorant idiots," you should seriously review your own. If anyone comes off sounding like, "An ignorant idiot," please look into a mirror.
As an American-born European, I have to admit the last posts are ignorant as much as arrogant. I am second-generation and most employees at those aforementioned offices are probably too to work in a Federal government offices. Not to mention the likelihood of their willingness to learn and study harder subjects like math and science courses as well as Written/verbal English in USA colleges. Your agency sure does hired a lot of uninformed bigots!?!?!?
ReplyDeleteThe good thing is...They are coming into the open from the closet...and we, the NAACP, and the rest will make it a priority to publicly identify and calling out each one of them, especially those who are working in the government or SSA for that fact !!
ReplyDeleteIt's sad to say....but as an Employee with Asian backgrounds, I doubted that the NAACP is really going to lessen much if any of our misery because "open season" on Asian-Americans has begun from all fronts and SSA is just one of the initiators.
ReplyDeleteIt's probably is a better group to vent angers by some narrow-minded racist people from the last 2 elections as well as this third latest one!!??
ReplyDeleteIt looks like coming out season by this agency employees and their HR managers against immigrants and other foreign-born. Such a darn shame for a socially mandated federal agency. May God bless SSA and this country
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