Staffing Losses Have Varied Greatly From State To State

 

https://www.cbpp.org/research/social-security/social-security-administration-cuts-hurt-every-state

 

Memorial Day 2022

 

Not That Many Claimants Asking For Congressional Help

     From a Social Security newsletter:

... Our Congressional Constituent Relations Staff (CCRS) expedites critical casework

and special handling requests and inquiries from district, State, and Capitol Hill offices. ...  

In FY 2021, CCRS assisted with over 6,600 congressional staff inquiries. This includes the

work of our Congressional Liaison office, which took over 330 claims and post-entitlement

actions, responded to almost 1,700 congressional and public inquiries, and handled over

100 direct contacts with current and former Members of Congress. ...

    Only 6,600 Congressional staff inquiries in a year for 535 Senators and Representatives? Considering the number of people having problems with Social Security that sounds quite low to me. Sounds like our members of Congress need to hear more from their constituents about the sorry state of service at Social Security.

Death And The Disability Insurance Benficiary

    From “How Does Mortality Among Disability-Program Beneficiaries Compare with That of the General Population? A Summary of Actuarial Estimates":

The mortality of DI [Disability Insurance] beneficiaries at any given age is highest during the first few years of benefit receipt and declines with the number of years on the DI rolls

In recent decades, mortality of DI beneficiaries during the first year of benefit receipt has declined at a faster rate, compared with the general population and DI beneficiaries at 10+ years of benefit receipt

Despite longevity gains, the mortality of DI beneficiaries in any time period, at any age, and at any benefit duration is substantially higher, relative to the general population.

What's It's All About

     From the just issued Spring 2022 Semiannual Report to Congress by Social Security's Inspector General: 

... Section 1129 of the Social Security Act, as amended, authorizes a [Civil Monetary Penalty] ... against anyone who: (1) makes a false or misleading statement to SSA to obtain or retain benefits or payments; (2) receives benefits or payments while withholding disclosure of a material fact; or (3) wrongfully converts a beneficiary’s payments while acting as a representative payee. We are authorized to impose penalties of up to $8,708 for each false or misleading statement, material omission, or conversion. Violators may also be subject to an assessment, in lieu of damages, of up to twice the amount of any resulting overpayment or conversion.  

During this reporting period, we resolved 55 Section 1129 cases and imposed $2,860,957 in penalties and assessments resulting from Section 1129 violations. ...

    If you've wondered why the Inspector General might have over penalized Social Security claimants who may have been less than truthful with Social Security, here's what it was all about. Pumping up this number to impress Congress. Doesn't seem worth it, does it?

What Do You Think?

     From Bloomberg Opinion:

... Even if private-sector employers see benefits in allowing workers to maintain hybrid work arrangements, the standard for public servants is different. Remote work hobbles the ability of government officials to collaborate, respond nimbly to crises, and forge consensus on policy goals. Because taxpayer funds will be spent maintaining federal buildings regardless, it also wastes money and worsens voters’ cynicism about government. ...

Just The First Step

     Jonathan Stein and Katherine Vengraitis have written an op ed for the Philadelphia Inquirer to explain why "Reopening Social Security offices is just the first step to serving those in need."

Waterfall Chart With CDRs

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What A Disaster!

     From Promoting Opportunity Demonstration: Final Evaluation Report, submitted to Social Security by Mathematica, a contractor:

...  POD [Promoting Opportunity Demonstration] was a randomized controlled trial that included two treatments of a benefit offset. The two treatment groups had the same benefit offset but different termination rules. Treatment group 1 (T1) did not face termination, but treatment group 2 (T2) faced termination after 12 consecutive months of earnings above the full offset amount (the point at which benefits were reduced to zero). ...

The key features of POD implementation included benefits counseling services and support for processing earnings adjustments, led by the implementation team, and recruitment, led by the evaluation team. ...

Approximately 30 percent of treatment group members used the POD benefit offset, with a median monthly offset amount of $351. More than 80 percent of offset users experienced a work-related overpayment or underpayment, requiring a retroactive adjustment to reconcile the difference. ...

We did not observe any statistically significant differences in outcomes between the two treatment groups for overall offset usage or the impact estimates for the primary outcomes. ...

There were limited statistically significant differences in observed outcomes for the POD treatment and control groups. There were impacts on one primary outcome (annualized SGA) and several other employment-related measures. For example, we found positive impacts on job search and use of Vocational Rehabilitation services, which might contribute to longer-term outcomes. These impacts were notable because they indicate that impacts could still emerge beyond the two-year evaluation window. ...

POD had positive net benefits for beneficiaries and net costs to SSA. The net benefits for beneficiaries were driven by increases in earnings and fringe benefits, and SSDI benefit amounts. The new costs were driven primarily by the increased benefit payments and costs for counseling services. ...

    Even with counseling, 80% of those using the offset ended up with an overpayment or underpayment! The experiment had only a limited effect on outcomes and ended up costing more money than it saved! Other than that, how was the play Mrs. Lincoln?

    Why can't policymakers admit the obvious? Social Security disability recipients are, for the most part, really, really sick. Everything under the sun has been tried to get them back to jobs. Nothing has worked. Nothing. The work incentive schemes just get more difficult and expensive to administer. They end up with messy results for the disability recipients who do attempt to return to work because the offsets are too complicated The schemes always end up costing more money than they save. There's no possible work incentives that will get any significant number of disability recipients back to work because they're too sick. 

    Crappy experiments like this are likely to go on forever because policymakers are blinded by their own preconceptions that it's easy to get on Social Security disability benefits and that a lot of disability recipients could work if given the right incentives. They don't bother to study the pathetic history of work incentive failure. They get sold on new schemes by contractors like Mathematica who end up getting paid even though their schemes never work. Even after this disaster this 406 page report ends with ideas for new schemes that could be tried!

“Serious Concerns” About IG

      From the Washington Post:

… The acting commissioner [of Social Security] “has very serious concerns about the issues raised by The Washington Post about the inspector general’s oversight of this program,” Scott Frey, chief of staff to Kilolo Kijakazi, said in an interview. Kijakazi has scheduled a meeting with her senior staff on Monday “to discuss how to proceed,” Frey said. …

A spokesman for the Senate Finance Committee, which also has jurisdiction over Social Security, said the committee is “evaluating a number of steps” in response to the article. …

     An extreme reduction in productivity has been signaling for months that something is wrong at OIG. 

More On House Social Security Subcommittee Hearing

    From the U.S. Sun, which is affiliated with a major British newspaper:

... [The Social Security Administration]  has encountered some issues keeping up with the volume of beneficiaries.

One of the major ways that problem manifests is in a lack of customer service.

Getting through to the SSA over the phone is difficult, and callers experience long wait times before getting any help. ...

On May 19, Congress held a hearing to see how it could help alleviate the administration's issue.

“In my home district in Oklahoma, seniors are completely unable to reach the Social Security Administration by phone,” Representative Kevin Hern (R-OK) said at the hearing.

“As a result, my elderly constituents end up calling my staff after many failed attempts to call the office at the Social Security Administration,” he said. ...

    I'd love to see some reporting on this from the NY Times and Washington Post.

Harsh Penalties For Overpaid Claimants Lead To Tumult At OIG

From the Washington Post:

Four years after her longtime partner died of kidney cancer, federal agents knocked on Gail Deckman’s door outside Chicago and told her she was in trouble: She had kept thousands of dollars in Social Security disability benefits that should have stopped when he died.

Deckman told the agents she thought the $1,400 check deposited each month into an account to which she had access was a payment for land her partner had sold in Michigan. She spent the money on rent and clothes and gifts for her grandchildren, she said.

The inspector general’s office, which investigates disability fraud and tries to recoup money for the government, ultimately charged her $119,392 — nearly three times what she received in error.

Deckman didn’t have the money. So the Social Security Administration garnished the entire $704 check she was going to receive every month when she retired from her minimum-wage job flipping burgers at the convenience store in her local Rebel gas station. She can apply for retirement in 2032 — when she’s 83. ...

The inflated fees were set in motion during the Trump administration, when attorneys in charge of a little-known anti-fraud program run by the inspector general’s office levied unprecedented fines against Deckman and more than 100 other beneficiaries without due process, according to interviews, documents and sworn testimony before an administrative law judge. In doing so, they disregarded regulations and deviated from how the program had recovered money since its inception in 1995, failing to take into account someone’s financial state, their age, their intentions and level of remorse, among other factors. ...

The escalating penalties created a giant jump — at least on paper — in the amount of money the inspector general could show lawmakers it was bringing in, according to interviews and sworn testimony obtained by The Washington Post. Fines as high as hundreds of thousands of dollars were imposed on poor, disabled and elderly people, many of whom had no hope of ever being able to pay.

A Chicago woman was fined $132,000 after wrongly receiving as much as $10,618 in benefits, according to internal data of penalties and assessments obtained by The Post. A Denver woman was sanctioned $168,000 after cashing as much as $14,960 in wrongly received checks. A New Jersey woman is on the hook for nearly $435,000 after she accepted about $47,000 in benefits but failed to report a $120,000 house she inherited from her father and car loans she co-signed for her children, on what she said was a lawyer’s advice. ...

The remarkable penalties led to tumult inside the Office of Inspector General Gail Ennis, where a whistleblower was targeted for retaliation, according to a ruling this month by the administrative judge at the Merit Systems Protection Board. ...

     The Chairmen of the Social Security Subcommittee and the Worker and Family Support Subcommittee  (which has jurisdiction over SSI) are calling for an investigation. There’s actually a process for investigating IGs.

Trying To Cram Telephone/Video Hearings Down The Throats Of Claimants?

     Yesterday I received word through the National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) that the number of hearings Social Security has scheduled for July and August is down more than 30%. We are told that they will try to schedule more hearings if we'll agree to hearings being held without receiving the notice period required by the agency's regulations and agree that the hearings be held either by telephone or video. 

    I've got three questions:

• Why has the agency scheduled so many fewer hearings this summer? It's not like they're run out of cases to schedule.
• If the problem were merely scheduling, why is it necessary to put pressure on claimants to accept telephone and video hearings? If you're doing in person hearings, you're doing in person hearings.
  
• Will there be a continuing effort to cram telephone and video hearings down the throats of destitute claimants by scheduling those hearings far more quickly?
  

Backlogs Go Up When Overtime Goes Down, As It Must When SSA Is Underfunded

     From the written testimony of Grace Kim, Deputy Commissioner, Operations, to the House Social Security Subcommittee:

Click on image to view full size

 

PC = Payment Center, where Title II disability benefits for older claimants are computed

OCO = Office of Central Operations, where Title II disability benefits for younger claimants are computed

EOY = End Of Year

A Report On Tuesday's Hearing

  There's a report on the CNBC website on Tuesday's House Social Security Subcommittee hearing. I don't see anything indicating that this appears anywhere other than online. There's no video that I see.

    Social Security's problems are receiving only limited media attention.

NCSSMA Says Field Office Employees Need To Be In The Office -- And What's This About SSA Being Unable To Accept E-Signatures?

     From the written testimony of Peggy Murphy for the National Council of Social Security Management Associations (NCSSMA) to the House Social Security Subcommittee:

... Field offices can be more responsive to the public only when employees are onsite. The current telework program in field offices makes it difficult to adjust to surges in office visitors or telephone calls while balancing appointments, scheduled and unscheduled employee leave, and back-end work. This is further complicated by having an appreciable number of field office employees continuing to work from home full-time due to personal circumstances. SSA has the technology and flexibility to consider transferring field office employees, who are unable to work in the office, to other components that can better accommodate their telework needs and limit the impact on front-line public service. We need employees in field offices who are able to work onsite and assist those who seek our help in person and to handle the multitude of workloads that are not portable. As an agency we need to be able to maintain our flexibility in the field offices so we can respond to surges from the public.

    By the way, Murphy's written testimony says that Social Security ought to accept electronic signatures. Per a White House order, they must! Social Security is mentioned by name in that order. Grace Kim, Social Security's  Deputy Commissioner for Operations, also testified that the agency couldn't yet accept electronic signatures. I don't understand this.

Testimony Of Grace Kim

     From the written testimony of Grace Kim, Deputy Commissioner Operations to the House Social Security Subcommittee:

... While we appreciate the increase over FY 2021, the FY 2022 appropriation of $13.3 billion is not sufficient. This budget limits our capacity to provide service to the millions of people who are applying for SSN cards; retirement, survivors, and disability benefits; and Supplemental Security Income benefits for people who are aged, blind, and disabled. Our funding has remained relatively flat for the previous four years, and appropriations for base administration have failed to cover our fixed costs over the past decade. For instance, the $411 million increase in FY 2022 does not fully pay for cost increases of approximately $550 million to cover employee pay raises, step increases, and Federal Employees Retirement System contributions. Of the $411 million increase we received, over 30 percent covered increased funding for our program integrity workloads, requiring us to prioritize stewardship over other essential workloads. We are also absorbing costs related to expanding in-person services, such as COVID-19 testing, facilities cleaning, more guards, and information technology (IT).

To fund these expenses and our fixed costs, we are delaying critically needed hires, reducing much needed overtime, and postponing select IT improvements. These delays in hiring and technology modernization, coupled with reduced overtime, are resulting in growing backlogs, which have reached unacceptable levels, and a deterioration in service. Less staff and delayed technological upgrades also mean we are not fully prepared to handle potential surges of people returning to our offices for in-person service.

Our employees are one of our greatest assets to help us address these unprecedented demands. We are facing our lowest staffing level in 25 years. This is driven by insufficient funding over multiple years to hire the level of staff needed, and higher than average attrition rates across the agency. Our funding level will constrain our ability to add the necessary staff to reduce the backlogs that have built up during the pandemic. It will also affect employee morale, which is already at a very low level, as demonstrated by the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey and recent Pulse Surveys.

Because of the FY 2022 funding level, we were forced to implement a temporary hiring freeze, including all external Federal hires and DDS hires. In our front-line components such as Field Offices, Teleservice Centers, and Processing Centers, attrition is nearly 7 percent so far this fiscal year, or 2,900 losses. The highest rate is in our Teleservice Centers at over 12 percent to date. At this pace, we believe we will lose over 4,500 front-line operations employees this year, which is 1,000 more losses than we experienced before the pandemic. This would equate to an annualized attrition rate of 11 percent, or about 4 percentage points higher than our historical average.

In our State DDSs, where medical decisions are adjudicated, attrition is also unprecedented, at over 25 percent. These complex jobs require about two years of training. The loss of experienced examiners significantly affects the ability to train new employees and complete program integrity workloads, such as continuing disability reviews, which are generally performed by more experienced examiners due to their complexity. We are working with the States to understand the underlying reasons. 

We are also severely limiting our use of overtime, which reduces our ability to compensate for staff losses. Reduced overtime in our Processing Centers is contributing to our current 4.5 million pending actions, which are up from 3.2 million at the end of 2018. We expect pending cases to surpass our 2016 record high of 4.6 million by the end of the fiscal year.

Additionally, the lack of overtime opportunities and the increasing workloads have resulted in low morale, with our employees reporting they feel overworked, overwhelmed, and exhausted.

We are at a crossroads. The cumulative impact will increase our customers’ wait times for in-person and phone service, increase claims processing times, and lead to increases in pending workloads. As we dig out from the effects of the pandemic, we must have sustained funding for the public to have continued confidence not just in our agency, but in government. We know people need our help, and Congress recognizes the importance of our local offices to communities. None of us think it is okay for applicants to wait six months for a decision on their disability application, but that is the level of service Congress and the public should expect absent sufficient resources. It will take a multi-year effort and adequate funding to restore pre-pandemic initial claim wait times. We hope we can work with you to resolve these funding challenges and restore the level of service the public requires. ...

    I have no reason to believe it's coming but Social Security needs a special appropriation -- now!

Biggs Nomination

     The President has nominated Andrew Biggs to become a member of the Social Security Advisory Board.

    During the George W. Bush Administration, Biggs was Deputy Commissioner of Social Security -- only in an acting capacity if I remember correctly. Biggs openly plotted partial privatization of Social Security and campaigned for it with George W. Bush while serving as Deputy Commissioner. That was beyond the pale in my opinion. Completely inappropriate. As I recall saying at the time, Biggs was put in a position where he was supposed to be making the trains run on time but what he actually wanted to do was to blow up the locomotives and tear up the tracks.

    As you may recall, George W. Bush's campaign to partially privatize Social Security went nowhere because it was a disaster politically. I have no idea why Republicans would want a man who is partially responsible for that fiasco in a position of honor.

    Why is President Biden nominating Biggs? I don't know but there must be some deal. He certainly wouldn't be nominated by this White House based on his merits. I have no idea what the White House is getting in return.

DDS Backlogs Draw Press Attention

     From the Chattanooga Times Free Press:

A longstanding backlog in the processing of disability benefits applications from people who are too sick to work has surpassed 1.1 million people nationally — a 27% increase from pre-pandemic levels two years ago and a level not seen in more than a decade.

In Tennessee, the number of people waiting to see if their disability benefits have been approved has increased by 40% ...

Attorneys in Tennessee say the long wait has imposed "significant hardships" on many of their clients, including losing homes, jobs and access to health care benefits received through employers. In extreme instances, attorneys described clients who have died — from illness and suicide — while waiting. ...

[Peter] Harris, who also serves as general counsel for the federal employee union that represents Social Security employees across the country, said the Social Security Administration and state disability determination departments have compounded the difficulties faced during the pandemic.

"Management has made things 20 times worse, and applicants have been left out in the cold," he said. "Employees [who process disability applications] are pushed in this environment to hurry things up." ...

Two New Rulings Related To Eric Conn Cases -- Reasonable Suspicion Is Enough Proof

     Social Security will publish two new Rulings in the Federal Register tomorrow. You can read them today. Here are a few excerpts:

• Social Security Ruling 22-1p: Fraud and Similar Fault Redeterminations Under Sections 205(u) and 1631(e)(7) of the Social Security Act -- "... We may find there is reason to believe fraud or similar fault was involved in a claim for benefits or payments, or in providing evidence, based on the actions of any individual whose actions affect an application for benefits or payments, or the evidence provided in support of it, even when such an individual has no direct relationship to the affected claimant, beneficiary, or recipient or acts without the affected claimant’s, beneficiary’s or recipient’s knowledge or participation. These individuals may include, but are not limited to, claimants, beneficiaries, auxiliaries, recipients, spouses, representatives, medical sources, translators, interpreters, and representative payees. For example, we may have reason to believe a medical source or a representative provided false information to support a claim without the knowledge or participation of the beneficiary or the recipient. ..."
• Social Security Ruling 22-2p: Evaluation of Claims Involving the Issue of Similar Fault in the Providing of Evidence -- "... We must disregard evidence under sections 205(u)(1)(B) and 1631(e)(7)(A)(ii) of the Act due to similar fault if there is reason to believe, meaning reasonable grounds to suspect, that the person knew the evidence provided was false or incomplete or that the information that was material to the determination was knowingly concealed. A finding of similar fault requires more than mere suspicion, speculation, or a hunch, but it does not require a preponderance of evidence. ..."
  

Signs Already Made Up To Tell You How Long You'll Have To Wait

     From a television station in Austin:

The mix of long outside lines and 95-degree heat is becoming a problem for some elderly and disabled customers at the Social Security Administration office in Georgetown.

“This is ridiculous,” said Melanie Barrier.

Barrier is one of the many people who lined up Thursday at 3010 Williams Drive. ...

The Georgetown woman contacted CBS Austin about the problem and met us at the social security office. On Friday, signs said the estimated wait time was 150 minutes or two and a half hours. ...

Top Baby Names By State

 

Click on image to view full size

Witness List For Tuesday's Hearing

     The witness list is out for the House Social Security Subcommittee hearing on May 17 on Strengthening Social Security's Customer Service:

• Grace Kim, Deputy Commissioner for Operations, Social Security Administration
• Tracey Gronniger, Directing Attorney, Justice in Aging
• Bethany Lilly, Senior Director of Public Policy, The Arc of the United States, on behalf of the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities Social Security Task Force
• Peggy Murphy, Immediate Past President, National Council of Social Security Management Associations
• Yanira Cruz, President and CEO, National Hispanic Council on Aging
• Alison Weir, Policy Advocate and Attorney, Greater Hartford Legal Aid, Hartford, Connecticut
• Rebecca Vallas, Senior Fellow, The Century Foundation

A Report On Social Security's Operating Budget

     The Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress produces reports to aid Congress in carrying out its duties. They've recently issued a report titled Social Security Administration (SSA): Trends in the Annual Limitation on Administrative Expenses (LAE) Appropriation Through FY2021 that's worth a look. It tells you everything you ought to know, even though for most people the subject, like the title of this report, seems dreadfully boring.

    Let me first explain this LAE business. Since most of Social Security's administrative budget comes from the Social Security's trust funds rather than general revenues, technically the agency doesn't get an appropriation but instead is given a limit on how much it can draw from the trust funds for its administrative expenses -- a Limitation on Administrative Expenses or LAE.

    The main story that I take from this report is that Social Security's workload has gone up while its LAE has gone down. That's not good for those who have to deal with the agency.

    Let's talk about the workload first.  Here's a chart showing the number of claimants drawing benefits from 2010 on:

You can see that since 2010 there's been a big increase from 58 million receiving benefits to 70.2 million receiving benefits. 

    Here's a chart showing what's happened to the LAE, apart from the amount specifically dedicated to program integrity, in constant dollars since 2010:

Notice that in price indexed dollars, the LAE went down from about $13 billion in FY 2010 to around $11 billion in 2021. I think that excluding program integrity funds gives the most accurate picture of what the agency can spend actually answering the telephone, taking and adjudicating claims and processing claimants on and off benefits. Note that Social Security didn't receive significant additional funding for the Covid-19 pandemic, which certainly disrupted its operations and increased its expenses so things are actually worse than they appear.

    Any rational person looking at this history shouldn't be surprised by what has happened since 2010 -- increased backlogs in answering the telephone, taking claims, adjudicating them and processing claimants on and off benefits. The severity of the resulting problems have been somewhat disguised since the agency's hearing backlog has gone down since 2010. That's highly visible but everything else has gone to hell and that's mostly invisible except to those who actually have to deal with the agency, which is almost everyone eventually, but not that many people at any onetime. Be glad if all you have to do is to file a retirement claim. The agency prioritizes them since they're easy. For everything else, get ready to wait and wait and wait.

    Social Security is a mess. The inadequate LAE is why it's a mess. Why has there been so little outcry from Congress?

OHO Stats

     This Caseload Analysis Report has been uploaded by Social Security. It's basic operating statistics for the agency's Office of Hearings Operations (OHO).

Click on image to view full size

 

Fee Cap Going To $7,200

   This afternoon Kilolo Kijakazi, Acting Commissioner of Social Security, informed the National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) and the National Association of Disability Representatives (NADR) that the Social Security Administration will raise the cap on the amount that attorneys may charge under the fee agreement process for representing claimants from $6,000 to $7,200.

    In this past, such announcements were made via the Federal Register. This has not yet been published in the Federal Register nor is it scheduled for publication tomorrow.  

    If this were a true cost of living adjustment, it would be going to $8,200, not $7,200.

    When the cap was raised the last time, in 2009, it was not effective until four and a half months after the announcement. I hear that this time it won't be effective until November 30, 2022 which is more than six months off! My hope the last time was that Social Security would use the time to train its staff but it was quickly apparent after the effective date that Social Security's staff hadn't been trained since at first there were more cases handled incorrectly than cases handled correctly. Nobody seemed to have been told that attorneys were allowed to have escalator clauses in their fee agreements that allowed them to be governed by the fee cap in place at the time of implementation rather than the fee cap in place at the time the fee agreement was signed even though this has been Social Security's position since the earliest days of the fee agreement process. I know. I was practicing Social Security law then. At least, back in 2009, we were able to get in touch with the payment centers to get mistakes corrected. They're mostly incommunicado these days and unwilling to correct even the most glaring mistakes.

    By the way, if you're an attorney who represents Social Security claimants and your fee agreement hasn't had an escalator clause, you're out of luck. Trying to force a new contract on your clients for your benefit is clearly unethical in my view.

About Time! Congressional Hearing On Customer Service At Social Security

     The House Social Security Subcommittee has FINALLY scheduled a hearing on Strengthening Social Security’s Customer Service for Thursday, May 17 at 2:00 EDT. Witnesses will be announced later.

    Now, if we could just get the House Appropriations Committee to also schedule a hearing, I'd be happier. Ways and Means Committee can provide publicity but better management isn't going to make an appreciable difference in service at Social Security. That's going to take money and the Appropriations Committee holds the key to that. (Of course, I'd also be happy to see Senate Finance Committee and Senate Appropriations Committee hearings!)

How Does It Feel?

online polls

Employee Viewpoint Survey

     The federal Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has issued its Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey for 2021. Over 11,000 Social Security employees responded. The survey results are reported in dozens of tables. I didn't see anything that jumped off the page. Overall, Social Security employees seem less happy than federal employees in general but not strikingly so. Take a look and tell us what you think.

Social Security Bulletin

     Social Security has posted the most recent issue of the Social Security Bulletin, the agency's  scholarly publication. It includes a study which asks "What Is the Relationship Between Socioeconomic Deprivation and Child Supplemental Security Income Participation?"

    Here are a couple of charts from that study:

Click on images to view full size

Support For Allowing NHC ALJs To Unionize

    From Government Executive:

A group of Democratic senators have revisited a long-dormant effort to broaden the bargaining unit of administrative law judges at the Social Security Administration, buoyed by recent guidance from the Biden administration aimed at encouraging collective bargaining at federal agencies.

In 2007, then-Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue created the agency’s National Hearing Center, a cadre of administrative law judges who would parachute into regions with a long backlog of disability claims, but he left the component’s employees outside of the ALJ bargaining unit at the Office of Hearing Operations, which is represented by the Association of Administrative Law Judges.

In 2011, the Federal Labor Relations Authority sided with Astrue, finding that although National Hearing Center judges had nearly identical job duties, they were management officials because they supervised decision writers. That said, the FLRA also found that the agency committed unfair labor practices by exhibiting hostility toward the union and failing to notify the group of the component’s creation.

In a letter to Acting Social Security Commissioner Kilolo Kijakazi last month, five Democratic senators, led by Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, urged the agency to consider classifying judges in the National Hearing Center as bargaining unit employees and granting them access to the Association of Administrative Law Judges. They cited the fact that in the years since the FLRA’s decision, the differences in the responsibilities of ALJs in both agency components have disappeared. ...

    Bad grammar in that first sentence! Tut, tut, tut

Conn Documentary Available On Apple TV+

From SK POP:

Apple TV+'s The Big Conn, a four-part docuseries, is set to explore the shocking real-life tale of Eric C. Conn. ...

Apple TV+ will release all four episodes together - May 6 at 3.00 am, Eastern Time (ET). In conjunction with the series, Apple will also release an exclusive companion podcast that will go into further depth into Conn's deception and his extravagant lifestyle, including new interviews and behind-the-scenes insights. ...

    My understanding is that this documentary will also focus on the real pain left behind for Conn's former clients who have ended up being harshly punished for Conn's misdeeds even though they did nothing wrong.

Most Popular Baby Names

     Social Security has released its list of most popular baby names for 2021:

Boys	Girls
1.     Liam	1.  Olivia
2.     Noah	2.  Emma
3.     Oliver	3.  Charlotte
4.     Elijah	4.  Amelia
5.     James	5.  Ava
6.     William	6.  Sophia
7.     Benjamin	7.  Isabella
8.     Lucas	8.  Mia
9.     Henry	9. Evelyn
10.  Theodore	10. Harper

    And here's the list of the fastest rising names for girls and boys in 2021:

Boys	Girls
1.     Amiri	1.  Raya
2.     Eliam	2.  Wrenley
3.     Colter	3.  Angelique
4.     Ozzy	4.  Vida
5.     Loyal	5.  Emberlynn

     I'm generally in the "What's in a name?" camp when it comes to names but all I can say after looking at the fastest rising list is "Yuck!"

NADE Newsletter

     The National Association of Disability Examiners (NADE), a voluntary organization of personnel who make initial and reconsideration determinations on disability claims for the Social Security Administration, has released its Spring 2022 newsletter. Almost all NADE members work for state governments who handle disability determination for Social Security at the first two levels of review. The states do the work under contract with Social Security. I won't bother explaining why states do this work but it goes back to the very beginning of disability determination for Social Security.

    There's a lot more in this newsletter that will be of interest beyond the NADE membership but here's a little nugget from a summary of a presentation by Grace Kim, Deputy Commissioner of Operations and some other SSA officials at NADE's mid-year meeting, "... to date in FY22, the [Disability Determination Service employee] attrition rate has increased in the examiner positions from 19.8% last fiscal year and is on track to hit 24.4% this fiscal year. ..." That is a staggeringly high turnover rate. I'm an employer. I don't know how you get complex work done with that high a turnover rate -- and yes, disability examiners do complex work. This is a big red flag telling us that something is very wrong and needs urgent attention.

Listings Extended

      Social Security has announced that it is extending its Listings for Special Senses and Speech, Hematological Disorders, and Congenital Disorders That Affect Multiple Body Systems without change.

ERE Down -- Again

     Social Security's ERE system that allows attorneys to access their clients' Social Security records online is down -- again. At least it can't be accessed in the normal way. This is happening more and more often.

    I hesitate to post them here for fear that it will cause them to crash but there are alternative URLs for ERE that seem to work. Maybe Social Security should post them if they won't cause the system to crash any more than it has already crashed.

Some Demographic Numbers For Disability Recipients

     Social Security has published a "Research and Statistics Note" with the catchy title: Characteristics of Noninstitutionalized DI, SSI, and OASI Program Participants, 2016 Update. Here are a few items from the report concerning Disability Insurance Benefits recipients that that catch my eye:

• Male 49.8%
• Female 50.2%
• Black 20.6%
• Hispanic 11.3%
• Less that H.S. diploma 16.4%
• H.S. diploma or equivalent 41.9%
• Some college 29.9%
• Bachelor's degree or higher 11.7%

    For comparison, women are 50.5% of the population so there's little proof of the "weaker vessel" theory in these numbers. Of course, workforce participation is lower among women than men.

    Blacks are about 14% of the population. The excessive number of disabled people who are black is easily explained. Educational attainments for blacks in America on average are significantly lower than for whites. Low educational attainment is strongly associated with disability claims because those with low educational attainments generally work in more physically demanding jobs, which are harder to perform after a person starts experiencing serious health problems. Those with low educational attainments also are less adaptable to jobs with lower exertional demands than those with high educational attainments. In general, my experience is that there is a high degree of exaggeration of educational attainment. Blacks and whites alike fib a lot when it comes to their educational background. They get used to exaggerating in order to get jobs and avoid embarrassment and keep doing it when they apply for disability benefits. Thus,  take all self-reported numbers on educational attainment with a grain of salt.

    Hispanics are 18% of the U.S. workforce, so the percent who are on disability benefits seems low. I hypothesize that the U.S. Hispanic workforce is, on average, significantly younger than the U.S. workforce in general. Disability claims are far more common among among older people. Many Hispanic workers just haven't aged into their prime years for disability claims.

    In general, note that, at most, about 12% of the population has a bachelor's degree. If you have a bachelor's degree, much less anything beyond that, realize that what you might be able to do despite physical impairments isn't necessarily what the average American can do, much less what someone who lacks a high school diploma can do. You can work in an office if you've got a bad  knee. You won't be able to do that as a maintenance mechanic or landscaper and you'll have a tough time finding something else you can do with a bad knee if you have little education. Also, remember that educational attainments are somewhat associated with native intelligence. If you have a low educational attainment, you may be not so bright. That also limits adaptability. To give a dated reference (to a no longer respectable source), this is not Lake Woebegone. All the children are not above average. In fact, a significant percentage of children and adults are significantly below average, a fact that limits them in many ways.

No Remedy For Unconstitutional Commissioner

     From the Court's summary of the 9th Circuit's decision in Kaufmann v. Kijakazi, decided on April 27, 2022:

... Claimant challenged the constitutionality of the statute that governed the President’s removal authority over the Commissioner, and the district court’s grant of the Commissioner’s Rule 59(e) motion. ...

The panel ... held that the President possessed the authority to remove the Commissioner of Social Security at will.

The final question was the appropriate remedy for claimant, whose appeal to the Appeals Council was denied while Commissioner Saul served under an unconstitutional removal provision. ...

... Because claimant did not show that the removal provision caused her any actual harm, the panel upheld the Commissioner’s decision denying her application for benefits. ...