Mike Causey at Federal News Network has penned a column saying that there may be a "plan F" to force employees at Social Security and other agencies such as the I.R.S. to return to the office, despite the risks posed by Covid-19. He says that there may be a desire to force experienced employees to retire. This would fit in with the Trump Administration push to reopen the economy, consequences be damned, as well as the Administration's general contempt for federal employees. Causey quotes some federal employees who state their fears there is a plan to force federal employees back to the office but the column is elliptical. It sounds like Causey has some information suggesting that these fears are grounded in fact. Where did he get this "plan F" business?
31 comments:
It would fit the meeting yesterday about how we are going to use masks, that we will all get 5 cloth ones to use and have to social distance. "Whenever" we return to work.
Attended that meeting, too. Some co workers have asthma or COPD and are concerned.
"Please let your manager know immediately if you cannot comply with wearing a mask......" and they'll see how close you are to retiring.
How can we answer phones, conduct interviews or record hearings with a mask on?
Going back Mgmt has already screened "high risk" employees ..i.e. > 65 ..or health issues etc...asking if "comfortable returning to office or continue teleworking.
@9:40
Using a mask is definitely a major concern for people with asthma, COPD, and other pulmonary conditions, but it shouldn't impact your ability to communicate. I've used one while speaking on my phone and it seems fine.
Using a mask is NOT legitimate concern for individuals with asthma, COPD and other pulmonary irritants (or for anyone else, for that matter). While patients with those conditions often complain about wearing masks, the perceived impact is essentially entirely psychological. In fact, individuals with those conditions are often encouraged by their physicians to wear masks in order to filter out allergens, chemicals, etc.
Please stop perpetuating this ignorant myth.
In any event, people with asthma, COPD and other respiratory conditions should be staying home until a vaccine has been deployed.
Starting to think those heading up their agencies want them to fail. Just heard the new head of the Postal Service wants to deliberately delay mail in some cases. https://www.syracuse.com/us-news/2020/07/mail-delays-likely-as-new-us-postal-service-head-pushes-cost-cutting.html
Saul seemed to hate telework prior to the pandemic presumably for no good reason. The Education head DeVos is a nightmare and presumably wants public education to fail.
However, this could not apply to the IRS because the government needs the tax collector.
I kind of understand these nefarious people wanting to privatize everything. But it also makes them look bad when they do fail. Smh.
Here’s a question I keep hearing, will there be early outs in FY 2020? I’ve heard many employees state they would take the out, in lieu of returning.
I read Causey's article but I don't think he said the Trump Adm wants to end telework in order to force experienced employees to retire. It's more likely that Trump and Saul want to end SSA telework, but they do not understand or have badly underestimated, just how many will retire rather than go back to the office.
The CDC guidelines for high risk employees are very confusing. Age 65, why did they raise the high risk age from 60 to 65? There are not many 65+ SSA employees and those age 60 through 64 will retire before coming back.
Also the other high risk categories such as "smoking" "obesity" "High blood pressure", just about everyone has something on that CDC list. How is SSA going to make medical determinations, potentially thousands of employees are going to ask for waivers for continued telework.
I suspect few have any idea what those at the top are really thinking, but it's difficulty to believe the agency would call so many employees, and invite so many medically fragile members of the public, back to the offices now, when most states are either reaching their peaks or seeing second surges on-par with or worse than their prior peaks earlier this year. And if they want mass retirements, there are plenty of other ways to achieve them without threatening to recklessly endanger their lives and suffer the wrath from Congress that would inevitably result.
@12:08
11:31 here. I never said it was a legitimate concern, I said it was a major concern. To be clear, it's a concern to those who have pulmonary conditions as they are generally not medical experts.
I do have asthma and I wear a mask whenever I am in public.
I will listen to my doctor regarding my COPD..NOT an anonymous person.
They are total idiots if they are trying to get the people with the most knowledge to retire . They are utter morons .
During our meeting, management stated that Social Security's
"medical advisory board" would "consider" the CDC's guidelines if bringing employees with underlying conditions back into the workplace. It sounds like management may try to bypass some of the CDC guidelines.
Did not receive the training but in the email they sent out it says in addition to fever, diarrhea, and coughs...which is reasonable.... People with fatigue, headache or muscle pain should not come into the office...neither personnel nor the public. It may be that no one will ever come into the office again
"Early Retirement" and "leave the agency" are the battle cry we hear every single time that something doesnt go a federal employees way.
Guess what guys and gals. It doesnt matter. So what you leave. The sun will come up the next day. Checks will go out every month. Sure it might be a little different for a while but nobody will even know after a while. The agency will just keep rolling along, like it has in the past and will again in the future.
Only difference is you will be making less.
9:09 PM Your comments reflects your lack of knowledge of the Social Security Administration. "checks will go out every month". Are you aware that many factors effect the amount of those checks, and whether those checks should go out? And that employees make the decisions about those checks?
High SSA officials have known for years that the Administration will be in trouble if there is a mass exodus of retirement eligible employees.
SSA employees do extremely complex tasks which require institutional knowledge and experience, and the decisions they make involve huge amounts of money. (Most SSA employees are underpaid, considering the difficulty of their jobs). It takes many years of experience to gain proficiency for these jobs.
If SSA prematurely ends telework and calls employees back to the office, the retirement wave will cause enormous damage to the Administration and the public we serve. The result of this would be increased backlogs in the payment centers and TSC, FO being unable to help claimants, and millions of dollars of incorrect payments.
I'll be happy either way.
Continued telework from the safety of my home...
Or if SSA ends telework, it's retirement and the start of my well-earned monthly CSRS pension, and the freedom to do what I want during the day.
Either way, I'm not going back.
I have copd and I don't have any problem with wearing a mask.
10:08am "the start of my well-earned monthly CSRS pension" -- that's assuming OPM doesn't have mass retirements too. It already takes months to get a pension processed, with fewer staff and much less institutional memory, it could take years.
12:24 it has always been the goal of the Trump administration to cause agencies to fail. Look at who he put in charge of the agencies. People who are against everything they stand for. the goal is to destroy and privatize which will lead to big profits for his donors, more cost for the government and less security for the workers. (look at what happened when the military and prisons when contractors are used) I worry that if Trump thinks he is going to lose then it will get much worse on his way out the door. If he can't control, destroy.
9:32 isnt that the same Crying Wolf thing we heard when all the initial SSI hires started retiring? Oh,, yeah, things kept moving along anyway didnt they. Nobody really noticed much difference.
@9:09 PM: "Did not receive the training but in the email they sent out it says in addition to fever, diarrhea, and coughs...which is reasonable.... People with fatigue, headache or muscle pain should not come into the office...neither personnel nor the public. It may be that no one will ever come into the office again"
Why aren't fatigue, headache and muscle pain reasonable symptoms to screen for? All three are known to be quite common in patients with confirmed COVID-19 cases. If your point is that this will screen out most employees, then your point is well taken. But sadly, I suspect in reality most employees and supervisors will recklessly ignore any self-screenings absent a confirmed COVID test.
Yes. My point was that although they may be common in COViD they are pretty universal among most disability claimants. Many days if I did not start out with a headache I have one after my commute or after three or four phone calls
The whole daily self screening thing needs to be replaced or supplemented by a temperature check at the door. Employees who have a fever shouldn't be allowed in because they may have the coronavirus.
Some employees pride themselves on never missing a day and they will continue to come to work even when ill. And some supervisors are naturally suspicious, and they will not be happy about employees calling them and saying their self check indicated they should not come in that day.
@8:11 "Guess what guys and gals. It doesnt matter. So what you leave."
Wow, pretty sensitive. You could say this about any employee. Does not eliminate their contribution to the work.
Maybe they will have the FPS and DHS escort staff to work as essential workers.I would be concerned after events in Portland. How far fetched is it to sign an executive order to have everyone report to work?
@858
Why would the leader of the executive branch need to sign an order to send executive branch employees back into the office? He and the agency heads will just order it to happen. Easy peasy!
Unless you mean ordering everyone back to work, which is impossible EO or not.
8:58 I don't see a tie between events in Portland, and SSA telework. It would be political suicide for DJT to sign an executive order for everyone to return to work, this close to the election. He'd lose far more votes with an order like that, than he would gain.
Many are considering retirement across the agency and Federal service. The virus surge has bee proven to be the result of younger people and Trumpers partying without masks. Do you think they will all of a sudden be responsible at work.
The upper level management of the agency doesn't care about losing "agency institutional knowledge". After all, only an incredibly minute number of them have any "agency institutional knowledge" whatsoever, and they consider themselves to be doing an outstanding job.
I guess they look at it like, the work isn't getting done with employees who have "agency institutional knowledge" (despite the fact that they never, ever, listen to those employees when making decisions), so it won't hurt if all the employees who know what they are doing retire as worst case, the work still won't get done.
ICE officers used to sit outside of our office for no reason. FPS guards used to treat the public like they were insurgents. I can believe management asking DHS to escort employees to work.
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