Pittsburgh Paper On Social Security Difficulties Faced By Parkinson's Patients

The Pittsburgh City Paper is reporting on the Social Security difficulties faced by younger individuals afflicted by Parkinson's disease. One might think that the very public plight of Michael J. Fox would have helped eased the situation for other younger individuals suffering from Parkinson's, but here is a quote from one person: "I told [the young-onset Parkinson's support group] I was applying for disability, and they all kind of laughed and told me their horror stories ... How it can take years and you can still be denied."

Social Security Budget -- For Next Week

From the Capitol Insider put out by the Disability Policy Collaboration:

This week marks the final week of FY 2007. It is clear that the Congress will not send any of the twelve FY 2008 appropriations bills to the President for his signature/veto before FY 2008 starts on October 1. Thus, the Congress will have to pass a Continuing Resolution (CR) this week to keep the federal government operating until the FY 2008 appropriations process is completed. Most rumors have the first CR lasting until mid November with programs funded at the current (FY 2007) levels.

The current level of funding means little or no new hiring -- of Administrative Law Judges or anybody else. Mid-November is not the outside on when the Social Security Administration would have a new budget. This impasse could be resolved by then or could drag on into the next calendar year. There is no serious dispute over the budget for the Social Security Administration, but serious disagreements about just about everything else.

New Regulation

From today's Federal Register:

This document contains a correction to the final rules that were published in the Federal Register on September 5, 2007 (72 FR 50871). The final rules amended our regulations to reflect two provisions of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 that affect the payment of benefits under title XVI of the Social Security Act (the Act). One of the provisions extended temporary institutionalization benefits to children receiving SSI benefits who enter private medical treatment facilities and who otherwise would be ineligible for temporary institutionalization benefits because of private insurance coverage. The other provision replaced obsolete terminology in the Act that referred to particular kinds of medical facilities and substituted a broader, more descriptive term.

Bush Still Wants To Cut Social Security

From the Associated Press:

The Bush administration said Monday the only way to permanently fix Social Security is through some combination of benefit cuts and tax increases.

That was one of the key findings in a new paper on Social Security released by the Treasury Department in an effort to achieve common ground on the politically explosive issue.

"Social Security can be made permanently solvent only by reducing the present value of scheduled benefits and/or increasing the present value of scheduled tax increases," the paper said. The Treasury paper said that while other changes to the giant benefit program might be desirable "only these changes can restore solvency permanently."

I do not understand why the Bush Administration says benefit cuts are necessary. My understanding is that simply removing the cap on earnings that are subject to the FICA tax takes care of 93% of the problem and does not affect most wage earners. Take a look at the "Social Security Game" put out by the American Academy of Actuaries and make your own choices.

The Rhinoceros In The Room?

Below is a small extract from a longer work from ERI, a company in the business of selling employment data, particularly what they regard as a replacement for the Dictionary of Occupational Titles (DOT) (Emphasis added).

Each month the eDOT Skills Project [one of ERI's products] collapses DOT jobs no longer found in the economy into remaining eDOT data (so that historic data is not lost and we don’t inadvertently, as we have and corrected, eliminate a job like “chicken debeaker” which still exists in the American economy). It should come as no surprise that unskilled, sedentary jobs are disappearing. The joke among PAQ [part of ERI, apparently] analysts is that the only unskilled, sedentary job to remain in America is the “DOT Killer.” [I think they are referring to those they accuse of wanting to destroy the DOT.] But you can’t joke about your opposition. As opponents, the “study of specific work” has politicians desiring to be reelected, executive administrations wishing to hide unacceptable unemployment rates, a major user group – career planning, admittedly finding the O*NET a superior alternative, a judicial system where pain and emotion are appealing compared to fact (the latter being appealable), an SSA focused on “studying the problem,” vocational experts who believe labor economic data is an “art not a science,” and a legal system where attorneys are magnificently compensated under the status quo.

If this makes little sense to you, let me try to give a little background. Social Security is denying tens of thousands of disability claims each year based upon the premise that there are many unskilled sedentary jobs in the economy. Social Security's evidence for the existence of these unskilled sedentary jobs is the DOT, which said that there were, but the DOT has not been updated in decades and is terribly out of date. ERI is saying that they have evidence that these unskilled sedentary jobs no longer exist. If they are right, tens of thousands of disability claimants are being denied improperly each year. ERI is saying that a lot of people have incentives to ignore this problem.

A Photo From The Late 1940s

Upside Down Scrambled SSNs

From the Register:

A Pennsylvania crusader has slapped Google with a $5bn lawsuit, claiming that the world's largest search engine is endangering his personal safety.

With a suit filed in federal court, Dylan Stephen Jayne insists that the company is guilty of "crimes against humanity" because its name turns up when his social security number is scrambled and turned upside down.

Senator Bryon Dorgan On Backlogs

A news release from Senator Byron Dorgan, a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee:

DORGAN WANTS INVESTIGATION OF SOCIAL SECURITY DISABILITY BENEFIT DENIALS, DELAY IN DECIDING APPEALS

2,800 North Dakotans now caught up in "broken system"

(WASHINGTON, D.C.) --- U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND) wants to know why 2,800 North Dakotans and hundreds of thousands of other Americans who have submitted disability claims under the Social Security Administration are being systematically denied, only to have them approved on appeal - after waiting nearly a year and a half.

"This system is broken," Dorgan said Thursday. "How else can one explain that the appeal process results in nearly two thirds of the claims that were previously denied finally being approved? Moreover, the huge backlog of claims means that many with disabilities are forced to live in poverty while waiting for a fair resolution of their disability claim."

Dorgan has asked the Inspector General's office to investigate what has caused these problems and to determine how it affects people.

"This is unfair to a lot of working Americans who have paid premiums in the form of their social security payroll tax for a program that includes disability payments if they become disabled," Dorgan said. "However, it seems that someone has decided they are going to systematically deny those claims and force those people to wait lengthy periods of time before an appeal will be heard. We now learn that nearly two thirds of the claims that have been denied were subsequently approved on appeal. This suggests to me that a whole lot of folks who are suffering with disabilities are being mistreated by this system and I want it fixed."

"Nationwide, there are more than three quarters of a million waiting in long backlogs to have their appeals decided. I don't know whether it is sheer incompetence or a deliberate decision to delay and deny benefits that people desperately need that have previously paid through the social security system, but I intend to find out."

In a letter to the President, Dorgan is also asking for action to correct the situation.

"The bottom line is that elderly Americans and other poor individuals with disabilities that prevent them earning a living and paying their bills deserve better," Dorgan wrote. "Social Security disability benefits keep millions of disabled Americans out of poverty. But these people who are unable to work and need immediate assistance to avoid financial collapse do not appear to be a priority for your Administration."