You Get What You Pay For

     This is from the Social Security Advisory Board's Aspects of Disability: Decision Making: Data and Materials. CDRs are Continuing Disability Reviews, reviews to determine whether a Social Security disability recipient is still disabled. These are required by statute. Most reviews are supposed to happen every three years. Even the most severely disabled are supposed to be reviewed every seven years (which is a waste of resources). A review by "mailer" is simply sending the disability benefits recipient a form to complete. Assuming the recipient completes the form and does not report that he or she has improved, which few do, it is almost certain that nothing will happen. Medical CDRs involve the collection of medical records to look to see how the recipient is actually doing. Note the dramatic decline in medical CDRs after George W. Bush was elected President. This was because of Social Security's severely restricted operating budget. After Democrats retook control of Congress in 2006 and Social Security's operating budget went up, the medical CDRs started going up and the nearly meaningless mailers went down, although not nearly enough to cross paths.

     This chart tells the story clearly. If you want real reviews to determine whether Social Security disability recipients remain disabled, you have to appropriate sufficient operating funds. This matters greatly since CDRs save about $10.50 for every dollar spent on them.

Fee Payment Numbers

     Below are the numbers on payments of fees to attorneys and others who represent Social Security claimants. While administered by Social Security, these payments come out of the back benefits of the claimants represented. Those who receive these fees pay a user fee to Social Security to cover the costs of administering the payments. Since the attorney or other representative receives his or her fee at about the same time as the claimant receives his or her benefits, these numbers are a good analogue to show how quickly or slowly Social Security is paying benefits to people after they are approved. As the numbers show, these payments vary dramatically from month to month.

Fee Payments
Month/Year	Volume	Amount
Jan-12	29,926	89,749,312.99
Feb-12	43,946	134,207,416.10
Mar-12	47,376	139,571,577.57
Apr-12	38,239	113,225,483.07
May-12	37,648	112,446,283.39

First Social Security Board

Left to right: (seated) Mary M. Dewson; Arthur J. Altmeyer, Chairman; and George E. Bigge. Standing are Jack B. Tate, Acting General Counsel and Frank Bane, (right) Executive Director

Warning: Witch Hunt Ahead

     Former Representative Charlie Melancon (D-La) warns that budget hawks have the Social Security disability programs in their sights as a target for a "witch hunt."

Ethics Complaint Concerning Attorneys Working For Non-Attorney Group

     I have received an anonymous report of an anonymous attorney ethics complaint filed with a state bar against some named attorneys who represent Social Security claimants in the employment of a non-attorney outfit. Representing clients as an attorney as an employee of a non-attorney is, in my understanding, itself a violation of attorney ethics rules. The complaint also alleges that the non-attorney group engages in practices which are considered unethical by attorneys. I will not give more details about an anonymous complaint.

     The complaint is interesting but I think it would be investigated more thoroughly if had not been filed anonymously. I know that Social Security has told its Administrative Law Judges not to file ethics complaints against attorneys which could explain why this is being filed anonymously but there is a detail, which I'm not to reveal here, concerning the material I received which suggests that it was not filed by any Social Security employee.

     There are many, many newly minted attorneys who are desperately seeking employment.  I feel for them but if you are representing Social Security claimants in the employment of a non-attorney group, you had better think about your situation from a legal ethics point of view. This is from the North Carolina Rules of Professional Conduct, which has its counterparts in every other state:

A lawyer shall not practice with or in the form of a professional corporation or association authorized to practice law for a profit, if:

     (1) a nonlawyer owns any interest therein, except that a fiduciary representative of the estate of a lawyer may hold the stock or interest of the lawyer for a reasonable time during administration; or

     (2) a nonlawyer has the right to direct or control the professional judgment of a lawyer.

OIDAP To End

      From an e-mail sent out by Mary Barros-Bailey, Chair of Social Security's Occupational Information Development Advisory Panel (OIDAP), which has been working on creating a successor to the Dictionary of Occupational Titles (DOT):

After over three years serving as the Chair to the Occupational Information Development Advisory Panel (OIDAP), this will be my last Message from the Chair.  On 21 May 2012, the Social Security Administration (SSA) decided that because of fiscal issues associated with the current Federal financial crisis, they would not extend the OIDAP charter beyond its expiration in July.  We are the last Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA) panel at SSA at this time.

     Occupational information is crucial in disability determination under the Social Security Act. Social Security's effort to create a new occupational information system is going forward full speed ahead. The only thing that is happening is that Social Security is dropping the pretense that there is anything independent about this. Abolishing OIDAP will make it even more difficult for the occupational information system it develops to be seen as credible by the courts, Congress and the public. It's hard for me to imagine Social Security submitting its occupational information system to independent review.

The Wealthy Get A Free Ride

     From a letter to the editor published in Sunday's New York Times:

In a nation that prides itself on fair play and equal opportunity, it seems incongruous that people with wealth-based income — interest, dividends, capital gains, rent — are excused from paying Social Security (traditionally 12.4 percent) and Medicare taxes (2.9 percent) on that income. Equally odd, they do not pay Social Security tax on wages above $110,100. Shouldn’t these taxes be paid on all income? Taxing the “earned” and not the “unearned” seems rather un-American, doesn’t it?

     Now wait for the sharp reaction from the paid shills who are the most ardent posters on this blog.

Most Social Security Representation By Attorneys

      From Aspects of Disability: Decision Making: Data and Materials issued by the Social Security Advisory Board.