More On Yesterday's Hearing

Joe Davidson's Federal Diary column in today's Washington Post discusses yesterday's hearing before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. Davidson reveals the crucial fact that "The investigations subcommittee is a bit unusual in that, unlike on most congressional panels, members of the minority party, Republicans at the moment, can initiate hearings." This hearing was initiated by Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla.). Coburn and two other Republican Senators had requested the report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

Astrue called the GAO report "fatally and hopelessly flawed" in his prepared remarks for the Subcommittee. He complained the the GAO report !inflammatorily characterized the situation it found." Gregory Kurtz, the GAO employee who prepared the report said that Social Security "expressed its displeasure even more vividly in private."

Unfortunately, Davidson accepts the basic premise of the GAO report that anyone who is working and drawing Social Security disability benefits at the same time is a fraud. As a matter of Social Security law, this is flatly wrong. It is quite legal to work and draw Social Security disability benefits at the same time within certain limits. Ask yourself a couple of simple questions. Do we want people who draw Social Security disability benefits to return to work? Is it a good idea to reflexively accuse someone who does this of a criminal offense?

Two Maryland Sites Under Review For National Data Center

From the Frederick News Post:

The Social Security Administration is looking for a new site for its National Data Center -- and Frederick County [Maryland] made the short list.

The end of Bennett Creek Boulevard in Urbana is one of two sites under consideration and both are in the state, according to a news release from U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md.

The other site is on Johnnycake Road in Woodlawn, in Baltimore County, according to the news release.

Improper Use Of Paid Administrative Leave

From the Federal Times:

The Social Security Administration paid nearly $1.5 million in wages to 16 employees who were not working while facing misconduct or criminal charges, according to the agency's inspector general [IG].

In a report released July 29, the IG said that paid administrative leave is meant to be used on a limited basis, so agencies can give potentially dangerous or criminal employees a month's advance notice that they will be indefinitely suspended. But the IG's report said 16 SSA employees were paid for months of work they didn't do between October 2005 and January 2009.

The Washington Times has also picked up on this story.

I guess they will have to fire everybody who made this mistake. That is what they did when an Administrative Law Judge made a similar mistake.

Senate Hearing Today

The Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs has scheduled a hearing for 2:30 this afternoon on Social Security Disability Fraud: Case Studies in Federal Employees and Commercial Drivers Licenses. The Chairman of the Subcommittee is Carl Levin of Michigan. Gregory Kutz of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue are supposed to testify.

From a Washington Post article today that may give some explanation for the hearing:

Almost 1,500 federal workers might have received improper or fraudulent Social Security payments in the past several years, according to a government audit disputed by the Social Security Administration.

Government Accountability Office investigators matched civilian federal payroll records with benefit data from the Social Security Disability Insurance program and the Supplemental Security Income program to yield their estimates. ...

About 7,000 federal workers received Social Security Administration (SSA) disability benefits while on the government payroll during fiscal year 2008. Almost 1,500 other federal employees may have received fraudulent or improper payments between October 2006 and December 2008, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

The potentially improper or fraudulent payments totaled about $1.7 million each month, according to GAO estimates. The exact number and nature of the payments cannot be determined without detailed case investigations, the GAO said....

The SSA currently does not match its records against federal payroll records to check whether federal workers are improperly receiving payments because their salaries exceed the programs' requirements, but officials acknowledged to the GAO that such a check could be helpful.

Social Security Commissioner Michael J. Astrue called the audit "fatally and hopelessly flawed," and said auditors improperly compared payroll data with SSA data.

"It relies on anecdotes and it inflammatorily characterized the situations it found," Astrue said in an interview. The audit provides little proof of whether the payments were improper or fraudulent and are small examples of fraud, he said. The Justice Department has declined to prosecute at least five of the 20 cases the GAO reviewed, because the payments in question fall below the threshold for prosecution, the SSA commissioner said.

Where do commercial drivers licenses fit in here? Why is Homeland Security and Government Affairs doing this hearing instead of the Senate Finance Committee?

I strongly suspect that this Committee is out of its depth here. The rules concerning Social Security disability recipients who return to work are incredibly complex. I strongly doubt that anyone at GAO or this Committee understands them. What they are casually talking about as fraud is probably nothing of the sort in most cases. I wonder if the Subcommittee staff realizes that until fairly recently Social Security had no system for keeping records on disability benefits recipients who reported return to work. That means that until recently, Social Security had no idea who had or had not reported return to work. Reports of return to work were simply ignored. That makes it a bit difficult to prosecute someone for fraud.

I am unable to see how returning to federal employment is any different than returning to other employment. All of this income is reported to Social Security and Social Security does data matches. The problem is that Social Security is many years behind in doing these data matches. Social Security is already well aware of this problem. Social Security has been prevented from getting up to date with this because of lack of personnel. If Social Security were given an extra billion or two billion dollars a year to hire more people, I guess the problem could be resolved in the foreseeable future. Social Security is not ignoring this problem because its officials are stupid or do not care. It is just that they have to also worry -- and I am being literal here -- about answering their telephone calls in less than seven or eight minutes and keeping the lines at their offices from routinely extending out their doors. The problem of delayed earnings records matches is only one of many problems leading to overpayments at Social Security. They are not going to be resolved without spending a lot of money.

What Do You Mean "We", Kemo Sabe?

From KTKA News:

On Tuesday, the head of the Social Security Administration Commissioner Michael Astrue arrived in Topeka to mark the opening of the state’s newest hearing office. The Topeka office is expected to cut down on the amount of time people must wait for a judge to hear their disability case. Next week, the office will start hearing cases.

“In the short term, this office allows times in Nebraska, Missouri and Kansas to start dropping very dramatically. Also, in the bigger picture, it is a great sign for the future of the agency we started 75 years ago, SSA Commissioner Michael Astrue said.

Yes, I realize that the "we" may be a reference to we as a nation but it still sounds odd coming from a Republican. The reporter may not have gotten the quote exactly right since she thought that Social Security was only given $500,000 in the Recovery Act to use in working down backlogs!

ALJ Employment Offers Being Made

There are reports that Social Security is making calls today offering jobs to some applicants for Administrative Law Judge positions. This is causing great excitement among the applicants.

Pomeroy's Plan Plays Well At Home

Congressman Earl Pomeroy's plan to give Social Security recipients a one time $250 payment if there is no cost of living adjustment in Social Security this year is playing well in his district in North Dakota. Pomeroy, the chairman of the House Social Security Subcommittee, is in tough re-election battle.

Social Security's Chief Actuary Questions Raising Normal Retirement Age

Stephen Goss, Social Security's Chief Actuary, has written an article for an issue of the Social Security Bulletin. Goss' article is worth reading in whole. Indeed most of this issue of the Social Security Bulletin, which is devoted to Social Security's impending 75th anniversary, is worth reading. Goss' most important point is that the primary cause of Social Security's long term funding problem is the decreased rate of fertility, that is, the average number of children born to the average American woman, rather than increased life expectancy. Goss throws in this paragraph towards the end of the article:

Because the large shift in the cost of the OASDI [Old Age, Survivors and Disability Insurance] program over the next 20 years is not due to increasing life expectancy, it is not clear that increasing the NRA [Normal Retirement Age] should be the principal approach for restoring long-term solvency. Increasing the unreduced retirement age beyond 67 is one option that may be considered, given that the population may be healthier in the future and able to work to an older average age. However, this raises the question of the adequacy of monthly benefit levels. After the NRA reaches 67, those persons claiming benefits at age 62 will receive only 70 percent of the unreduced benefit level. Further increase in the NRA would decrease the adequacy of monthly benefits at age 62, and at all other ages, even further.

Raising the normal retirement age has been the favorite plan of many on the right for "fixing" Social Security. My opinion is that increasing the normal retirement age to 67 was a bad idea and that increasing it to 70 is a horrible idea. Raising the normal retirement age to 70 would be terrific way to decrease public support for Social Security, which is exactly why those on the right promote the idea.