Social Security Websites Down

I thought that Social Security was only going to do some database work this weekend. However, just try accessing anything that Social Security normally has on the web. Virtually everything other than Social Security's home page is down. I doubt that many will be inconvenienced, but this does seem extreme.

AFGE Criticizes iClaims And Ready Retirement -- And Social Security's Involvement With Voter Registration

From a press release issued by the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), a union, which represents much of Social Security's workforce:

The Social Security Administration recently has tried several new directives for dealing with benefit applicants, including a new system for filing Social Security benefits via the Internet. Some of the new directives already are causing problems for the SSA and applicants alike.

The new iClaims and Ready Retirement initiatives were designed to streamline the Social Security Administration by moving the public to Internet services, but according the American Federation of Government Employees, it is doing the opposite. “Without an SSA employee adjudicating the claims, we run the risk of fraud and incorrect claims being filed,” said AFGE Council 220 President Witold Skwierczynski.

“It’s not only people who are filling out fraudulent applications, but applicants who just don’t understand the confusing iClaims process and are unknowingly cheating themselves out of their deserved benefits,” said Skwierczynski. “Moving the public over to Internet services short-changes anyone who attempts to use these services and creates a situation where fraud easily can occur. Filing for Social Security benefits is not something easily handled over the Internet, particularly if the applicant is not computer savvy.”

The press release ends with this swipe at Social Security's involvement with voter registration:

AFGE also is concerned about how the SSA is dealing with the Help America Vote Act. States are required to authenticate new registration applicants using the last four digits of their Social Security number or driver’s license, and match that number to the Social Security database. However, databases are prone to errors such as data entry mistakes which result in spelling mistakes, and switched numbers. Because of this there is now a 28.5 percent error rate with the matches between voter registration records and the SSA database.

NPRM On Representation Of Claimants -- Part VII -- Entities As Representatives

I think this will be the last installment of my comments on Social Security's Notice of Proposed Rule-Making (NPRM) on representation of claimants.

My comments today have to do with the concept of an entity as a representative of claimants. The NPRM defines an entity as "any business, firm, or other association, including but not limited to partnerships, corporations, for-profit organizations, and not-for-profit organizations." An entity may be a principal representative and a professional representative. Direct payment of fees may be made to an entity that meets these conditions:

(1) The entity must attest that it is in possession of a signed statement from each attorney or non-attorney who has performed any representational services for the claim in question that includes the following:
(i) The attorney or non-attorney has performed all representational services on behalf of the entity, (ii) Any fees paid pursuant to the services the attorney or non-attorney have provided should be paid directly to the entity, and
(iii) The attorney or non-attorney representative receives compensation for the services provided directly from the entity.
(2) The entity must attest that all individuals who have provided representational services on the claim in question are individuals who qualify for direct payment under the Act or the direct payment demonstration project, as defined in § 404.1717.

Beyond this, the NPRM provides almost no guidance on how entities are to be treated.

I have already posted about the omission of a definition for the term, "representational services," and the contradiction between the apparent requirement that one attorney or non-attorney representative perform all "representational services" for an entity and the basic concept of allowing entities to represent claimants.

Let me list other questions about how entities are to be treated that occur to me after reading this NPRM:

1. What happens when we make the transition to allowing entities to represent claimants and firms begin changing the name of the representative on pending cases from an individual to an entity? Does this mean that the fee agreement process no longer applies, that the case is automatically a fee agreement case?
   
2. What happens when an entity breaks up? Does the claimant no longer have any kind of representative? Does this mean that the fee agreement process can no longer apply, that the fee petition process automatically applies?
   
3. How will Social Security deal with a situation in which an entity, which we will call Smith & Smith, breaks in half and each of the newly separated halves of Smith & Smith claims to be the true successor to Smith & Smith?
4. What if the entity we are calling Smith & Smith is a partnership, but decides to become a professional corporation. Does the change in the formal nature of the business mean that it becomes a different entity, so that the fee agreement process no longer applies?
5. What happens if an attorney practicing as a solo decides to join an established firm that already has multiple attorneys representing Social Security claimants? If the attorney substitutes the entity he or she has just joined as the representative of his or her clients, do these claimants now have a new representative, so that the fee agreement process no longer applies?
6. What happens if two entities merge?
   
7. To what extent can an entity allow employees who are not attorneys or otherwise eligible for withholding of fees to work on a case? Can the entity have someone not eligible for withholding of fees appear at the hearing? (I know this is another way of asking what is meant by "representational services", but this is a crucial issue.)
8. What happens to an entity which breaks the rules? We know what happens to individuals who break the rules -- they can lose their right to practice before the Social Security Administration. Does an entire entity lose the right to practice before Social Security if one person acting on behalf of the entity breaks the rules? If not, how do we know whom to punish? Should the entity be able to walk away from breaking the rules merely by firing one person? What if an entity has a pattern of breaking the rules? At what point can the entire entity lose the right to represent claimants?
   

You may comment on this proposal online and I encourage you to do so. This proposal has many implications. It appears to me that Social Security had difficulty drafting it and the end result is unsatisfactory. There should be many comments.

The Social Security Plum List

Social Security keeps a convenient list of the Presidential appointments concerning Social Security. It gives a convenient summary of what appointments will be available to the incoming President. I had not realized that Sylvester Schieber's term as head of the Social Security Advisory Board was about to end, for instance, or that Jeffrey Brown's term on the Board has already ended.

The big appointments, assuming Michael Astrue does not resign after the election, are Deputy Commissioner of Social Security and Inspector General.

I've Got Stats For You

Social Security has released a report with the catchy title of "Earnings and Employment Data for Workers Covered Under Social Security and Medicare, by State and County, 2005." I will not pretend that it is all that interesting, but you can compare the county you live in to other counties in your state and elsewhere. Here are what Social Security considers to be the highlights:

Social Security

• In 2005, 159.1 million workers had earnings taxable under the Social Security program. About 141.9 million had only wages, 9.6 million had only self-employment income, and 6.8 million had both.
• Social Security taxable earnings totaled $4.768 trillion, which includes earnings up to the taxable maximum of $90,000.
• Social Security taxes totaled about $591 billion.

Medicare

• In 2005, 162.9 million workers had earnings taxable under the Medicare program. About 145.6 million had only wages, 9.5 million had only self-employment income, and 7.8 million had both.
• Medicare taxable earnings totaled $5.886 trillion.
• Medicare taxes totaled about $171 billion.

Social Security has also issued the "SSI Annual Statistical Report, 2007." The highlights:

Size and Scope of the Supplemental Security Income Program

• About 7.4 million people received federally administered payments in December 2007.
• The average monthly payment in December 2007 was $468.
• Total payments for the year were more than $41 billion, including about $4 billion in federally administered state supplementation.

Profile of Recipients

• The majority were female (56 percent).
• Fifteen percent were under age 18, 57 percent were aged 18 to 64, and 27 percent were aged 65 or older.
• Most (83 percent) were eligible on the basis of a disability.
• Almost 5 out of 10 recipients under the age of 65 were diagnosed with a mentaldisorder.
• More than half (56 percent) had no income other than their SSI payment.
• Thirty-five percent of SSI recipients also received Social Security benefits.
• Of the people receiving SSI benefits, about 2 percent were residing in a Title XIX institution where Medicaid was paying more than half of the cost.
• Despite their disabilities, about 357,000 recipients (5.7 percent) were working in December 2007.

Bomb Scare In Wilkes-Barre

Social Security's Data Operations Center in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania was evacuated yesterday for hours due to a bomb scare. Fortunately, it was a false alarm.

Mental Impairment Listings Still Hanging

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) cleared new proposed mental impairment listings on July 9, three months ago. Normally, Notices of Proposed Rule-Making (NPRMs) appear in the Federal Register within a few days after being cleared by OMB, but not this one.

I do not know what is going on, but I have to wonder if this NPRM is being held up due to the proximity to the election or the proximity to the change in administration. Everything about Social Security's handling of mental impairment cases was extremely controversial in the early '80s when Michael Astrue last worked at Social Security. Any significant tightening of these listings would be controversial today, perhaps controversial enough to catch the attention of the general public. Even if this is not the sort of thing that could have even a minor effect upon the election, an Obama administration might have very different feelings about this proposal than the Bush administration or a McCain administration. John McCain appears to have exhibited little sensitivity to mental health issues. A statement that McCain gave to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) seems to me to display little enthuaism for helping the mentally ill and a strong tendency to emphasize substance abuse and personal responsibility when talking about mental illness. Contrast McCain's statement with the responses that Obama gave to a NAMI questionnaire.

Will this NPRM be published shortly after the election? Will this version of the proposal never be published because a revised version of the proposal will be resubmitted to OMB after the new President takes office? Will the election result affect what happens with the mental impairment listings? My best guess, worth every penny you paid for it, is that the NPRM gets published immediately after the election if McCain wins, but never gets published if Obama wins because a different proposal more favorable to the mentally ill will be submitted to the OMB once Obama takes office.

Barack Obama On Social Security Disability

Barack Obama's website says that if elected he intends to create a National Commission on People with Disabilities, Employment and Social Security with the intention of:

• Examining and proposing solutions to work disincentives in the SSDI, SSI, Medicare, and Medicaid programs.
• Revisiting the Ticket to Work Act to assess how it can better provide SSDI and SSI beneficiaries with the supports they need to transition into work.
• Considering opportunities to improve the results produced through the relationships between the SSDI and SSI programs and the workforce investment and vocational rehabilitation systems.
• Examining the sufficiency of SSDI and SSI benefit levels in light of available work opportunities for working-age people with disabilities.
• Determining the sufficiency of the “substantial gainful activity” level in the SSDI program and whether it should be indexed to average hourly wages or some other measure.
• Studying programs that would help young people join the labor force rather than the SSI rolls.

He would also:

Streamline the Social Security Approval Process: The Social Security Administration (SSA) has been consistently under-funded, resulting in unconscionable delays in initial claims determinations and hearings for individuals applying for the Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Social Security Supplement Security Income (SSI) programs. The SSA's disability claims backlog has reached a record high of 755,000, up from 311,000 in 2000. The average wait time for an appeals hearing averages 505 days and, in some cases, can exceed three years. Barack Obama and Joe Biden believe that it is unacceptable to have a system in which individuals lose their homes or are forced to declare bankruptcy because the federal government cannot process their claims quickly enough. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are committed to streamlining the current application and appeals procedures to reduce the confusion that surrounds these important programs. As president, Obama will also ensure that the SSA has the funding it needs to hire judges and staff and to invest in technology to expedite final decisions. Obama supported the $150 million increase in the SSA's budget that was vetoed by President Bush this year. As president, he will continue to work to ensure that the SSA has the resources it needs for hiring and to more effectively process its caseloads.

I will post on John McCain's positions on Social Security disability issues if anyone can find them for me. I have been unable to find them.