You Can Comment On Forthcoming SSA.Gov Website

      From a Social Security blog:

We are excited to share a preview of our new website coming this year. ...

The new design – we call it our beta website – seeks to improve your online experience, so you can get to the information and services you need faster. We also include new interactive tools, like our new benefit eligibility screener. It’s a convenient way to learn if you might be eligible for benefits, without needing to know what benefit programs are available from Social Security.

Your opinion is very important to us. We invite you to explore our beta website at beta.ssa.gov and to use the “Feedback” button on the right side of the screen to tell us what you think. You can visit the website on your computer, tablet, and smartphone.

The beta website is a work in progress. Some links you select may take you to webpages on the current SSA.gov. ...

A Surprising Blog Post From The "Vampire Squid" Guy

      Matt Taibbi, who is a contributing editor for Rolling Stone, has posted on his blog about Social Security. In the first part, he talks about Social Security's performance evaluation system of all things. By the way, my experience is that all performance evaluation systems are a mess. There's no good way of doing it. Taibbi segues into a discussion of Social Security's disability claim adjudication process. Taibbi seems to have conflated the jobs done by different categories of employees in ways which make the system seem even more odd than it actually is.

     Taibbi, by the way, famously described Goldman Sachs as a "vampire squid." Goldman Sachs will have to live with that one for a long, long time.

A Forum On Extreme Limitations In The Ability To Focus

     From a post on Social Security Administration Matters, the agency's blog:

Gathering and assessing medical evidence is a key part of how we make our decisions. On Wednesday, March 30, we will host our next National Disability Forum, Developing and Assessing Medical Evidence for Extreme Limitations in the Ability to Focus on Tasks.

     The blog post doesn't say how one can participate in this forum. It does say that one can share ideas on the agency's IdeaScale website or as a comment on the blog itself. A graphic says that the forum will be held at the National Education Association in Washington. 

Top Ten List

     Monique Morrissey of the Economic Policy Institute posts her list of top ten myths about Social Security.

Is Raising Social Security Benefits An Idea That Has Entered The Political Mainstream?

     The Pacific Standard reports on Duncan Black, who blogs under the name Atrios. According to the Pacific Standard, Atrios has introduced into the political marketplace the startling notion of increasing Social Security benefits.

     For obvious reasons, I like to think that bloggers can make a difference. However, I'm not sure that the notion of increasing Social Security benefits was ever a completely unknown idea or that Atrios has moved that idea closer to becoming reality. Over the years I've often heard those on the left saying that Social Security benefits should be increased, not cut. Those views were on the periphery. I'd say they remain on the periphery. Time will tell whether this idea really moves into the mainstream. 

     My gut feeling is that Atrios is simply responding to the larger theme that long term demographic trends strongly favor the Democratic party and liberal policies in general. If events unfold as this theory holds, the Republican party, as currently constituted, would lose almost all of its power over the next ten to fifteen years. Would Social Security be increased if this comes to pass? Maybe. It's just too far off to tell.

New Blog On Social Security Disability Issues

     Julia Mariani, an attorney who had been representing Social Security disability claimants, has shut down her regular practice and taken up blogging on Social Security disability issues. So far, her blog,  Disability Dunk Tank, has a different focus from mine. She is oriented just to disability issues and attuned to the issues that claimants face.

     I wish there was a wider profusion of blogs on Social Security issues. Social Security has a huge impact on America. It deserves widespread coverage by non-traditional media.

FPS To The Rescue

     According to one blogger, the Federal Protective Service (FPS) sent something like a SWAT team, with a semiautomatic weapon and a bomb sniffing dog, to the Leesburg, VA Social Security field office this past week with no advance warning and for no reason other than training.

Worth Reading

A blogger writes about her experience with security at a Social Security field office.

ALJ Has Blog

Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) Ed Pitts of St. Louis is posting on his St. Louis Sojourn blog about his work as an ALJ.

Senator Snowe On Social Security Funding

Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME), a member of the Senate Finance Committee, was present and asked questions at today's hearing. This afternoon, she posted the following on her blog at The Hill:

Both Congress and the Administration have failed mightily to provide the Social Security Administration the resources it needs to assist the millions of Americans who rely on its services. Consequently, the Agency has been unable to hire new employees to replace the 10 percent of its workforce that has retired in just the last two years.

As baby boomers begin applying for Social Security and disability claims increase, it is absolutely critical that Congress provide the appropriate funding to address this shortfall and prepare for future challenges. Our constituents deserve nothing less, and we must not fail to act on this priority.

New Psychiatric Listings In The Works

Shrinkrap on the Social Security Perspectives blog associated with this blog is reporting that the Social Security Administration is hard at work on new psychiatric Listings. Shrinkrap should know since he is part of the group working on the new Listings. Any hints you can give us, Shrinkrap?

By the way, Social Security Perspectives is supposed to be a group blog, but so far it is a group of one. Use the feedback button on the right to let me know if you want to join.

Social Security Perspectives Blog

I have established a separate Social Security Perspectives blog as a group blog for those who want to post about Social Security topics. So far, only one person has signed up as a blogger and there are only a few posts. If you are interested in posting on this group blog, please use the feedback button on the right side of the page to e-mail me. I can tell you that there are some people who are already checking Social Security Perspectives on a daily basis. Probably a few hundred readers will check out Social Security Perspectives as a result of this post.

The Name "Mohammad"

This is a bit off topic, but fascinating. It is from a blog by the editors of Foreign Policy Magazine:

Last week we learned that Mohammed was the #2 name for baby boys in Britain last year, when the top 14 spellings were considered.

Of course, that made me wonder, how popular is Mohammed in the United States? So I visited the website of the U.S. Social Security Administration, which provides the top 1,000 baby names for each sex going back to the late 1800s. No spellings of Mohammed made it into the top 1,000 until 1976, when Muhammad came in 976th place with 73 births.

In 2006, Mohammed ranked #217, between Dominick and Rafael, when the four spellings that made it into the top 1,000 (Mohamed, Mohammad, Mohammed, and Muhammad, in order of decreasing popularity) were considered. No other spelling has ever made it into the top 1,000.

Then I wondered, were Muslims hesitant to name their sons Mohammed after the 9/11 terrorist attacks? It looks like that might have been the case, at least for a while. The graph below shows how many Mohammeds of all four aforementioned spellings were born in the United States each year since 1976, with data coming from Social Security card applications.

Interestingly, a total of 27,350 Mohammeds of the top four spellings were born from 1976 to 2006. That may sound like a lot, but 24,418 Jacobs were born last year alone.

Social Security Blogs

Considering that there may be 60 million blogs and considering that the Social Security Administration employs around 55,000 people and considering that one American in five receives Social Security benefits, it is amazing just how few Social Security blogs there are. If we exclude inactive blogs and exclude blogs that only post occasionally on Social Security issues and exclude blogs that post only for or against privatization of Social Security, I count only five Social Security blogs in addition to this one.

Take a look at my list of Social Security blogs. If you know of one that should be added to the list, let me know. But also consider starting your own Social Security blog. If you read this blog regularly, you might just have something you would like to say on the subject of Social Security. I post my real name on this blog, but blogs can be anonymous.

1. Disability Blog
2. Federal Disability Claims
3. My Disability Blog
4. Social Security Disability Blog
5. Ultimate Social Security Disability Guide