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Republicans Balk At Extending FICA Reduction

That apparent agreement to extend the partial FICA tax holiday for two months is on hold now. Republicans in the House of Representatives have some demands they want to make. Democrats may be unwilling to accede to any of their demands. Stay tuned.

Disability And Unemployment Again

     From the Wall Street Journal:

Many poor Americans seek Social Security disability payments as a financial life preserver when their unemployment benefits begin expiring, preliminary research by two economists shows.

The findings, released by the Obama administration Thursday, are based on interviews with unemployed workers ...

Their research found that close to 10% of Americans between the ages of 50 and 65 who didn’t have access to at least $5,000 applied for Social Security disability benefits by the time their unemployment benefits were set to expire. The percent of this group seeking the benefits rose precipitously in the weeks leading up to the exhaustion of benefits, as it was below 1% with 50 weeks left in unemployment benefits.

Jobless Americans in this age range who had access to at least $5,000 were much less likely to seek SSDI benefits at any point while collecting unemployment benefits.

     Of course, many people who are disabled wait to apply for Social Security disability until they exhaust all other possible benefits. This is because the process of obtaining Social Security disability benefits is widely and accurately regarded as unpleasant and difficult. Most people do everything they can to avoid it. That is a huge problem for anyone like myself who helps Social Security disability claimants. They often wait until the wolf is at the door before applying and then hear me or someone like me tell them that they face a process that will take two years and that the result is uncertain. If you're relying upon a claim for Social Security disability as your "life preserver" you're in big trouble. When companies lay off people, they often select their least productive workers to lay off. The least productive workers are often those with serious health problems, especially mental illness. Theoretically, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) may forbid this but the ADA is a dead letter, interpreted out of any meaningful existence by the Supreme Court. Even people who started out on unemployment benefits relatively healthy may get sick and then wait for their unemployment benefits to end before applying for Social Security disability benefits. Being laid off is not good for your health. It's stressful and your access to health care is diminished.
     The plain fact is that anyone can look at a chart displaying the disability incidence rate and the unemployment rate and see that common wisdom notwithstanding there is virtually no link between the two.

What Do You Think?

     I think the following post on this blog is from a ringer:

I work for the agency and happen to be in a position to personally observe field office operations in multiple offices. Yes, there are some very hard working employees, but there are many more slackers. The constant use of cell phones for personal calls (even taking calls while in an interview) and texting, and the excessive surfing of the internet is incredible. I have pretty much lost sympathy for the agency. I don't think a furlough of many of the employees would be noticeable, that is how little they produce. The early closings of offices is a joke as now many employees see it as an opportunity to leave early, not to work. The hours of 7:00 to 9:00 in the morning are woefully wasted unless there is training. Most days it is just used for excessive chatting and visiting. And this is just in the field. I know several employees who were detailed to CO where they saw employees there routinely take 2 hour lunches on SSA time. As for most field office managers, well, they are vastly overpaid as they do not spend most of their time managing, but "networking" on the phone and politicking.

     I know that Social Security employees have a variety of experiences and viewpoints but this one does not ring true to me. There are not that many Social Security employees who would have the opportunity to visit multiple field offices. For the most part, employees would be on their best behavior when such people were around since they would be management. How well would visiting personnel get to know what was going on in the field offices? How many people get detailed to work in Social Security's central offices? I wouldn't think there would be many even at the regional office level. I know that Social Security employees are no more perfect than any other large group of people but this seems way over the top. What do you think of this post?

FICA Reductions Extended For Two Months

     The reductions in the FICA tax  that have been in effect since the beginning of this year have been extended for another two months. The FICA tax goes into Social Security's trust funds. The Treasury is making up the difference for the Social Security trust funds.

Pathetic

From the New York Daily News:

Frank Lucas, who once ran a billion-dollar business smuggling heroin before going straight, could go to jail for bilking the U.S. government out of $17,300.

Now 81 and ailing, Lucas was charged with theft by deception after he allegedly told the U.S. Treasury he lost a Social Security check with funds earmarked for his 15-year-old son and asked for a duplicate, prosecutors said.

Withholding ALJ Assignment Information

     Let me give a brief comment on Social Security's plan to withhold the identity of the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) to whom an appeal is assigned until the day of the hearing. As a general matter it does not matter much to me. I do not prepare cases any different depending upon which ALJ the case is assigned to. Any differences in the way I present a case are minor. I can easily adjust on the day of the hearing since I know all of the local ALJs. Many others who practice Social Security law feel different.

     The idea that this will prevent "judge shopping" is, for the most part, ridiculous. The only way that an attorney can "judge shop" at Social Security is to decline to do a video hearing with a particular ALJ if it is known that the ALJ will not schedule an in person hearing. That is only a small percentage of cases. 

     What I am hearing from my colleagues is that many will refuse to do any video hearings with out of area ALJs under this policy since they would have no way of knowing anything about the ALJ in advance of the hearing. I may do this myself since the danger with having to deal with an out of town ALJ with serious peculiarities with no advance warning is all too real.

     My guess is that attorneys refusing to do hearings with the national hearing offices will become an even greater problem for Social Security under the new policy. Instead of trying to do one thing after another to keep the national hearing offices going, perhaps Social Security should revisit the entire idea of the national hearing offices. Was it really a good idea to create them?