Some Projections From The Acting Commissioner

     From a statement attached to a letter from the Acting Commissioner to the Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee:

... We anticipate that some performance measures will show improvement in FY 2023 [in processing of initial claims at the Disability Determination Services], while others may show temporary degradation. We will process 129,000 or 7 percent more initial disability claims than in FY 2022 (52-week measure). However, wait times for a disability decision at the initial and appeal levels will increase for a period of time because backlogs will continue to grow while we hire and train new staff. ...

As of December 2022, we reduced our pending number of hearings to about 355,000 and reduced the average wait time for a hearing to 442 days from the peak of 633 days in September 2017. We are currently experiencing a temporary increase in the average processing time because we are working through our oldest cases for individuals who chose to wait for an in-person hearing rather than accepting a video or telephone hearing when our offices were closed to the public during the pandemic. We project that our monthly average processing time for hearings will be 390 days at the end of FY 2023. ...

In FY 2023, we expect to transition our National 800 Number to a modern telecommunication platform, improving service and providing more self-service opportunities for the public. In FY 2023, we estimate our speed of answer will be approximately 35 minutes compared to 33 minutes in FY 2022, while our busy rate will be 15 percent compared to 6 percent in FY 2022. ...

    Despite the discouraging figures actually presented, the overall tone of the statement is quite positive. I don't know why you'd sugarcoat the situation. Overall, things will keep getting worse until Social Security gets enough money to operate the agency. There's no way to manage the agency out of this mess. It will take more warm bodies to get the work done and that costs money.

Sounds Good To Me

     From Marketwatch:

Social Security should be able to pay out full benefits until 2035 without any intervention, but a proposal by Sen. Bernie Sanders would extend the life of the program for 75 years, chief actuary Stephen Goss said.  ...     

The Social Security Expansion Act aims not only to pay out full benefits but, as the name implies, to bolster the program. Under the proposal, Social Security would provide an additional $2,400 in benefits to each beneficiary every year. The program would also be linked to the experimental price index for the elderly, or CPI-E, instead of the consumer-price index for urban wage earners and clerical workers, or CPI-W. The switch would change the cost-of-living adjustment to align more closely with older Americans’ spending. 

 The proposal calls for two new taxes: a 12.4% tax on investment income for individuals earning $250,000 or more per year, and a 16.2% net-investment-income tax for specific business owners, including active S-corporation holders and active limited partners. The proceeds of the latter tax would be divided between the retirement and disability trust funds and the general Treasury fund. ...

     This isn't happening, at least not now. There wouldn't be a majority in the Senate for this and the House is under the nominal control of the GOP. I mention it because it's an honest attempt to deal with the problem, unlike ridiculous Republican claims that they want to "reform" Social Security, without raising taxes or cutting benefits.

    What I love seeing in response to proposals like this is the cynical argument that it does no good to raise taxes on the wealthy. They'll just use tax tricks to avoid paying the tax. Sure. So why do these wealthy people employ shills to spread the cynical argument in forums like this? Who else but shills would spread that sort of garbage? Of course the wealthy would pay more under Senator Sanders' proposal. That's why they fight it with such vigor.

Proposal To Omit Food From SSI In-Kind Support And Maintenance Calculations

     To appear in tomorrow's Federal Register:

We propose to update our regulations to remove food from the calculation of In-Kind Support and Maintenance (ISM). We also propose to add conforming language to our definition of income, excluding food from the ISM calculation. Accordingly, Supplemental Security Income (SSI) applicants and recipients would no longer need to provide information about their food expenses for us to consider in our ISM calculations. We expect that these changes will simplify our rules, making them less cumbersome to administer and easier for the public to understand and follow. These simplifications would make it easier for SSI applicants and recipients to comply with our program requirements, which would save time for both them and us, and improve the equitable treatment of food assistance within the SSI program. The proposed rule also includes other, minor revisions to the regulations related to income, including clarifying our longstanding position that income may be received “constructively” (we will define this term below).

    Remember, this is only a proposal. At best, it will be many months before this comes into effect.

Deaths Of Children And Social Security Disability

    If you're directly involved with Social Security's process of disability determination, have you noticed the number of claimants who have suffered the death of a child? I've got no numbers but I've been struck over the years by how frequently this comes up. I'm talking about adult children as well as young children. I'm talking about deaths from disease as well as death in accidents and assaults and death by drug overdose. We all know these deaths occur and that they're tragic but, thank goodness, it's uncommon. Yet, it seems that once a month I'm seeing a case. We all know that these deaths have terrible effects upon families when they do occur. Most of the time it's not psychiatric illness that gets the claimant but a very real physical ailment.

    I wish someone would do a study on this.

    I don't know how people survived in the bad old days when childhood deaths were so common. My own grandmother was a generally cheerful woman and certainly a wonderful person to me but there always seemed a tinge of sadness about her. I only found out later that she had lost two children to a typhoid epidemic before my father was born and was never quite the same again. (Yes, I'm that old but typhoid epidemics aren't as far back in this country's history as you might think.) I now possess a memorial quilt that she made after these deaths. I'm sure that making that quilt helped with her grief.

Wait Times Are Terrible

      From CNET:

In December about the status of their disability benefits applications. The average wait time for a decision was seven months, the longest it's been in 14 years, according to a recent report from USA Facts.

Jeff Nesbit, deputy communications commissioner for Social Security, said years of inadequate funding means the agency "cannot keep up with the demand for service and our annual fixed cost increases." 

Disability Determination Services, which assesses disability claims, has been hit particularly hard, Nesbit wrote in a September 2022 memo, "due to historically high attrition as workloads become less reasonable with fewer staff."

I'm Sure It Seemed Like Easy Money At The Time

     From a press release:

The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania announced that Takiyah Gordon Austin, age 47, formerly of Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania, pleaded guilty yesterday before U.S. District Court Judge Malachy E. Mannion, for a scheme to fraudulently obtain unemployment benefits related to COVID-19 emergency relief funds. ...

Takiyah Gordon Austin engaged in a scheme to abuse her position as a claims specialist for the Social Security Administration in order to obtain the personally identifiable information of unsuspecting individuals. Austin then utilized that information to file for and receive fraudulent Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) claims and benefit payments.  As part of the scheme, Austin also filed PUA claims for ineligible individuals in exchange for payment from the individuals. 

    The fraud pulled in over $288,000. She was charged with wire fraud among other offenses. Wire fraud has a 20 year maximum jail term.

I Thought We Decided Social Security Was Constitutional Over 80 Years Ago

     From Slate:

... For years now, right-wing litigators have argued that the CFPB [Consumer Financial Protection Bureau] is unconstitutional because it is funded independently: The agency draws its budget from the Federal Reserve, which in turn draws its budget from interest on securities. Because Congress does not directly appropriate money to the CFPB every year, lawyers claimed, its funding violates the Constitution’s appropriations clause. ...

At least seven different federal courts dismissed this theory until it landed in the 5^th Circuit, the nation’s Trumpiest appeals court. In May 2022, Judge Edith Jones—a Ronald Reagan appointee and hard-right bomb-thrower—wrote a 39-page concurrence asserting that the CFPB is funded unconstitutionally. Four other judges joined her. Then, in October, a three-judge panel formally declared that the CFPB’s independent budget mechanism renders the entire agency unconstitutional. Judge Cory Wilson, writing for the panel, revoked the CFPB’s ability to issue or enforce any regulations. (All three members of the panel were appointed by Donald Trump.) Thus, under the current law of the 5^th Circuit, the CFPB effectively does not exist. ...

You might wonder: What does this skirmish over a small financial agency have to do with hundreds of billions of dollars in annual entitlement spending? The answer: everything. In her concurrence, Jones took pains to clarify that her reasoning was not limited to the CFPB. Jones announced that all “appropriations to the executive must be temporally bound.” If Congress does not put a “time limit” on funding, it gives the executive branch too much discretion over spending. Under the Constitution, she claimed, the executive must “come ‘cap in hand’ to the legislature at regular intervals” to ensure that it remains “dependent” and “accountable.” ...

If their view becomes the law of the land, it will empower courts to abolish trillions of dollars in entitlement spending. Why? Because today two-thirds of annual federal spending is “mandatory”—including some of our nation’s most beloved social safety net programs. All of this spending amounted to $5.2 trillion in fiscal year 2021 that would suddenly be at risk of elimination by judicial fiat. ...

Does this principle derive from the Constitution? Of course not. The appropriations clause at question simply states that all money drawn from the treasury must be “in consequence of appropriations made by law.” There is no textual requirement that Congress reauthorize appropriations periodically. In fact, Article 1 of the Constitution suggests the exact opposite: It bars Congress from appropriating money to the Army “for a longer term than two years,” implying that other kinds of long-term appropriations are permissible. If they weren’t, then why would Army appropriations need an explicit time limit? ...

    Be careful what you ask for GOP. You might get it.

Stats On OHO Operations

 

Click on image to view full size

    

    This report is for the Office of Hearings Operations (OHO).

We're All In Agreement, Right?

     From USA Today:

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., stood up from her seat in the back of the House chamber to heckle President Joe Biden after he said during his State of the Union address Tuesday that “some Republicans want Medicare and Social Security to sunset” while discussing the need to raise the debt ceiling in order to avoid a US default.

“Liar!” she said. Other lawmakers in the chamber booed him. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, seated behind Biden, shook his head in disapproval.  ...

As boos continued, Biden turned toward the House gallery to address an audience member not seen on camera. 

"It's being proposed by individuals," he said. "I'm politely not naming them, but it's being proposed by some of you."  ...

As the camera landed on individual lawmakers, it captured a shot of a stunned Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah [who has openly talked about his desire to 'phase out" Social Security], who looked around the room with his mouth wide open. 

“So folks, as we all apparently agree, Social Security and Medicare is off the books now,” Biden said. “They're not to be touched? All right. We've got unanimity!"

Cheers erupted in the chamber.

"Tonight, let's all agree, and apparently we are — let's stand up for seniors," Biden said, raising his fists in the air. Speaker McCarthy took to his feet. ...

Why Does Anyone Think That Private Accounts Could Replace Social Security?

     From Michael Hiltzik at the Los Angeles Times:

Former Vice President Mike Pence dipped his toes into the presidential campaign waters Feb. 2 with a proposal that would mean the death of Social Security. ...

Pence unearthed the old Republican idea of privatizing Social Security wholly or partially. ...

Pence didn’t say outright that he advocates killing Social Security. Instead, he took the course I reported on just last week. That’s the Republican and conservative habit of employing plausible-sounding jargon and economists’ gibberish to conceal their intention to hobble the program. ...

But make no mistake: Diverting any significant portion of Social Security taxes into private accounts would make the program unworkable, funnel untold wealth into the hands of Wall Street promoters and leave millions of families destitute. ...

[Pence] whined about “this trajectory of massive debt that we’re piling on the backs of [our] grandchildren” and attributed most of it to Social Security and Medicare (the “entitlements”). Never mind that well more than $1 trillion of that debt was incurred when his party passed a massive tax cut for the rich in 2017. ...

He promised, as Social Security “reformers” always do, that he would hold seniors harmless: “To everyone that’s got hair the same color hair as me, nothing’s going to change for you,” but younger Americans would face a changed landscape, “better choices that would also be better for the country.”

This is also a cherished Republican stunt — guaranteeing that their “reforms” won’t harm current retirees and the near-retired. It’s pure politics because they know that seniors would slaughter them at the polls otherwise. But if their ideas are so great, one must ask, why not impose them on everybody? ...

    I won't repeat it here but Hiltzik goes on to eviscerate every premise that has ever supported the notion of private accounts to replace Social Security. No, they're not a pathway to wealth for Americans. No, they're not at all safe. No, they wouldn't begin to replace the protection against disability and early death contained in the Social Security Act. No, they can't replace the inflation protection of the Social Security Act. As Hiltzik concludes:

It’s a crap shoot. And in craps, like any other gamble promoted as a sure thing, it’s the house that wins. Pence is carrying water for the Wall Street firms that will be circling small investors to suck up their assets. When they’re done, there will be nothing left of Social Security.

SSI Regulations Advance

     Almost a year after it was submitted to them for review, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has finally approved proposed rules to omit food from in-kind support and maintenance SSI calculations. However, this does not mean that the proposed regulations will come into effect anytime soon. They must first be published in the Federal Register for public comment. Social Security must then consider the comments and prepare a final version of the regulations which must again be submitted to OMB for approval. This could easily take 24 months, especially if OMB is going to sit on it for a year.

A Poll

 

online polls

Raising Retirement Age Unpopular In France

     From the Associated Press:

An estimated 1.27 million people took to the streets of French cities, towns and villages Tuesday, according to the Interior Ministry, in new massive protests against the government’s key pension reform plans. ...

The nationwide strikes and protests were a crucial test both for President Emmanuel Macron and his opponents. The government says it is determined to push through Macron’s election pledge to reform France’s pension system. And strong popular resentment will strengthen efforts by labor unions and left-wing legislators to block the bill, which would raise the retirement age from 62 to 64. ...

Rail operator SNCF said most train services were knocked out in the Paris region, in all other regions and on France’s flagship high-speed network linking cities and major towns. The Paris Metro was also hard hit by station closures and cancellations.

Power workers also demonstrated their support for the strikes by temporarily reducing electricity supplies, without causing blackouts, power producer EDF said. ...

Appropriations Subcommittee Members

     I posted earlier about the members of the House Social Security Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee. At least as important is the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee (which also covers Social Security). They're the ones deciding how much money each agency under their purview gets to spend. Here are the members of that Subcommittee for this Congress:

Republicans

• Rep. Robert Aderholt (AL) – Chair
• Rep. Mike Simpson (ID)
• Rep. Andy Harris (MD)
• Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (TN)
• Rep. John Moolenaar (MI)
• Rep. Julia Letlow (LA)
• Rep. Andrew Clyde (GA)
• Rep. Jake LaTurner (KS)
• Rep. Jake Ellzey (TX)
• Rep. Juan Ciscomani (AZ)
  

Democrats 

• Rep. Rosa DeLauro (CT) – Ranking Member 
• Rep. Steny Hoyer (MD)
  
• Rep. Barbara Lee (CA)
• Rep. Mark Pocan (WI)
  
• Rep. Lois Frankel (FL)
  
• Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman  (NJ)
  
• Rep. Josh Harder (CA)
  

    DeLauro is Ranking Member for the entire Committee. She was Chair of the entire Committee and its Labor, Health and Human Services, Education Subcommittee in the last Congress. In the past she hasn't seemed all that interested in funding for the Social Security Administration.

Some Listings Will Become Harder To Meet

     Social Security's musculoskeletal Listings will become harder to meet this November. As written many of these Listings require that all relevant criteria be present simultaneously or "within a close proximity of time." Because of the Covid-19 pandemic this became hard to prove since access to healthcare, particularly in person health care, became more difficult. In July 2021 Social Security adopted a temporary rule loosening these requirements until "6 months after the effective date of a determination by the Secretary of Health and Human Services under section 319 of the Public Health Service Act, 42 U.S.C. 247d, that the national public health emergency resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic no longer exists." Newspapers are reporting that the President plans to issue an order ending the public health emergency on May 11, 2023. Thus, the Listings will become harder to meet as of Veterans Day in November. 

    The musculoskeletal Listings have been too hard to meet even with the temporary rule in place suspending some of their worst aspects. They will become even more harsh. They need re-examination.

Ferguson To Be New Chairman Of House Social Security Subcommittee

     Congressman Drew Ferguson will be the new Chairman of the House Ways and Means Social Security Subcommittee. Ferguson was not on this Subcommittee in the last Congress. Apparently, he's a mainline Republican Congressman -- an election denier who wants to outlaw abortion and same sex marriage, for instance. He was very much opposed to blocking Social Security recipients who need representative payees from buying firearms. This is what he said in the press release on his appointment as Chairman of the Social Security Subcommittee:

... As a member of the Committee on Ways and Means and House Budget Committee, I am ready to roll up my sleeves and get our country back on track with responsible fiscal and pro-growth policies. For the last two years, the radical Left’s out-of-control, big government spending resulted in an economic crisis – causing hardworking Americans to suffer with record high inflation and putting our nation on the brink of a recession. 

“We will reverse course and enact policies to maintain American competitiveness and innovation, economic growth, and fiscal responsibility. As the Chairman of the Subcommittee on Social Security, I will be a leading voice for our nation’s seniors, and advance solutions to some of the most pressing issues facing our country today.” ...

    The problem is that for many Republicans in Congress the only solution for any Social Security issue is to cut benefits somehow, such as by raising full retirement age. I'm not saying that's his view or that he'd get anywhere if that is his view, but that's the milieu he's coming from. There's also the prevailing Republican viewpoint that since government is infinitely wasteful, cuts in agency operating budgets can have no effect upon agency service. The agencies will get by just by reducing waste. At least that's their viewpoint as to non-defense spending.

    Would he be interested in working on the more mundane problems at Social Security, such as getting their phones answered, where he might make a difference? We'll see but I'm expecting hearings asking why Social Security allows people to freely change their gender in agency records and why any Social Security employees are allowed to do any work from home.

 

    Below is the full list of Subcommittee members -- at least as announced so far. Since this list includes an equal number of Democrats and Republicans, I think there may be another Republican or two to be added.

 

Republicans

• Drew Ferguson, Chairman
• David Schweikert 
• David Kustoff
• Tom Rice
• Jodey Arrington

 

Democrats

• John B. Larson, Ranking Member
  
• Bill Pascrell, Jr.
• Linda T. Sánchez
• Brian Higgins
• Dan Kildee

Social Security’s Immigration Problem

      From the Motley Fool:

… Look at social media message boards, and you'll find one commonly repeated viewpoint: That undocumented workers receiving benefits are to blame for Social Security's financial shortcomings. Immigration into the U.S., in general, seems to be a regular scapegoat for why America's top retirement program is struggling.

But this school of thought couldn't be more wrong.

Social Security's problem isn't that too many immigrants are flocking to the United States. Rather, it's that net-legal immigration has been declining for a quarter of a century. Since 1998, the net migration rate into the U.S. has fallen every single year, and is down by an aggregate of 57%, according to data from the United Nations. 

Most people legally migrating to the U.S. tend to be younger, which is an extremely important point. These are people who will spend decades in the labor force contributing to Social Security via the payroll tax. The 12.4% payroll tax on earned income (wages and salary) was responsible for providing approximately $981 billion (90.1%) of the $1.088 trillion in revenue Social Security collected in 2021. 

The intermediate-cost model in the 2022 Trustees Report -- the "intermediate-cost model" is what the Trustees view as the outcome likeliest to happen -- is based on average annual total net immigration of 1,246,000 people.  Between July 1, 2012, and June 30, 2017, fewer than 955,000 total net migrants entered the U.S. annually, according to data from the World Bank.  If net migration into the U.S. continues to fall, or even steadies at these reduced levels, it's all but a certainty that Social Security's funding shortfall will grow. …

Now How About A Commissioner Nomination?

     The President has nominated Kathryn Lang to became a member of the Social Security Advisory Board. Lang is Director of Federal Income Security at Justice in Aging, a national non-profit legal organization that fights against senior poverty. She has worked with Social Security and SSI issues.

Disability Backlogs Are Cruel

     From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (paywall):

A hospital social worker helped Nicholas Johnson fill out dozens of pages of paperwork for Social Security Disability Insurance in September after he woke up from a coma and realized he was paralyzed. ...

Johnson missed two phone calls from the Social Security office while he was in physical therapy. He started the application process over, for a third time, in early January. 

With no income, Johnson can’t pay rent, so he moved in with his grandmother. But her home is too small to accommodate his wheelchair, so family members come over daily to carry him from room to room. ...

Johnson is one of more than 2,000 people in Milwaukee waiting for the Social Security Administration's approval to receive disability benefits, according to the latest data available from the agency. The average wait time is 368 days, leaving many people struggling without adequate housing or money to pay for their basic needs for more than a year. ...

Hope Lloyd is a community living and home supervisor with Independence First who is working with about a dozen people in Milwaukee with spinal cord injuries who haven't been able to get their first disability checks, so they are living in nursing homes or with family. 

"It's not where they belong, but without those expedited payments, they can’t  apply for an apartment because they don't have any income," Lloyd said. "A lot of times, they're the primary breadwinner, so it's just really, really bad." ...

At the state level, the Wisconsin Department of Health Services said a mandated federal update to its computer system in late 2019 further pushed wait times. 

"Wisconsin’s legacy system was superior to the current (federal) system because it included more automatic prompts for examiners that made it easier for them to manage their very high caseloads," said Jennifer Miller, a spokeswoman with DHS. 

Miller said examiners receive specialized training that takes more than two years to become fully proficient.  

"As a result of increased evidence, increased scrutiny, continuously growing case complexity, and a new nationwide case processing system rollout, case production has become more labor-intensive and slower," Miller said. "Adjudicators’ case counts have increased significantly, and the job has become untenable in many states. ...

I've Got News For The AARP: That $785 Million Appropriation Increase Is Less Than The Increase In Inflation So Don't Expect Improved Service

     From AARP:

We’re asking the Social Security Administration (SSA) to put customer service on the front burner now that Congress and the Biden administration have approved a $785 million budget increase for the agency.

AARP members sent Congress more than 200,000 emails last year urging it to approve more funding for customer service issues amid historically high wait times and a backlog in disability claims. The agency primarily blamed the delays on years of understaffing and insufficient funds. ...

We wrote to SSA Acting Commissioner Kilolo Kijakazi last week, urging her to make customer service a top priority in the operating plan the agency is required to submit to Congress next month as part of the recently approved 2023 spending bill. ...