Charges For Nonprogram-Related Services

      From today's Federal Register:

... [W]e collect information from individuals and entities, such as other governmental agencies, and then store this information in our systems. ... When we release this information for a purpose not related to  implementation of our programs, we consider it a nonprogram-related service. Nonprogram-related services are not within our mission, and we are required to recover the cost of providing those services. ... Under our regulations, whenever we determine a request for information is for any purpose not directly related to the administration of the Social Security programs, we require the requester to pay the full cost of providing the information. ...

[W]e are implementing standard fees that are calculated to reflect the full cost of providing information for nonprogram-related purposes ...

The new standard fee schedule per request:

Copy an Electronic Folder.................................... $49
Copy a Paper Folder............................................. 86
Letter Forwarding................................................ 35
3rd Party Manual SSN Verification...................... 29
Regional Office Certification............................... 48
Office of Central Operations Certification.......... 32
W2/W3 Requests.................................................. 38
Record Extract.................................................... 33

      Let me hasten to say that this appears not to be directed at attorneys and others who represent Social Security claimants since they are involved in a program-related service. However, the notice does not specify how Social Security will determine what is program-related and what is nonprogram-related.
     By the way, let me give an example of how the letter forwarding charge would arise. A woman contacts Social Security to file a widow's claim on the account of her husband who disappeared some years earlier. After seven years, if the absence is unexplained the man may be presumed dead. However, Social Security looks in its records and determines that the man is alive and still working. The woman wants her husband's address so she may contact him but Social Security refuses on Privacy Act grounds. However, Social Security will forward a letter to the husband.

Ryan Plan Would End Automatic Medicaid For SSI Recipients

     Another element of Paul Ryan's budget plan: Persons who are approved for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) would no longer be automatically eligible for Medicaid. That would be at the discretion of the states which would be receiving much less federal funding for Medicaid.

Social Security Subcommittee Chairman Wants Work Incentives Planning Programs Back

     Sam Johnson, Chairman of the House Social Security Subcommittee, sent Commissioner Michael Astrue a letter complaining about Astrue's decision to end two programs that assist disability benefits recipients in planning return to work. Apparently, Johnson and Astrue are trading legalistic arguments over the subject. The underlying problem is that Social Security's budget is ridiculously tight and neither program ever demonstrated much than one could reasonably call success. 

     We needs to understand a couple of things:

• Everything anyone can imagine to encourage disability benefits recipients to return to work has been tried, including tossing many people off disability benefits. None of it has succeeded in returning more than a tiny percentage of people to work.
• The only thing anyone can reasonably do to make even a marginal difference in the rate of return to work is to simplify Social Security's return to work incentives. Over the decades, there has been constant Congressional interest in painlessly cutting the numbers of people drawing disability benefits by enticing disability benefits recipients back to work. Again and again, Congress has passed some new incentive program to go on top of the incentive programs already in place.This has left us with a ridiculous crazy quilt of work incentives that almost no one understands. You don't solve the problem by diverting scarce resources to hiring work incentive specialists. Their existence was a symptom of the problem. You solve the problem by simplifying. If the work incentives can't be explained in two simple sentences, they're too complicated.

Another Think Tank Report On Social Security Disability

     The think tanks are really churning out reports on the Social Security disability programs. The latest comes from  Kathy Ruffing of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Her report includes this interesting chart:

     Claims filed are highly sensitive to business cycle? Note that applications for disability benefits began soaring not in 2008 when unemployment soared but in 1998, ten years earlier, at a time of relatively low unemployment. Note also the inverse relationship between unemployment and the disability claim rate in the early 1980s. How do you explain these facts if claims filed are so sensitive to business cycles?

Social Security Starting To Come Up In Presidential Campaign

     To no one's surprise, Democrats are starting to attack the Romney-Ryan ticket over Social Security. Plans for partial privatization of Social Security play well with Republican voters but not with the electorate as a whole.

Get Rich Quick!

     From a website:

This is Brian Mittman and I want to ask you few questions…Is your practice feeling the effects of “TORT” REFORM, ATTORNEY BASHING, the Stalled Economy, HIGH UNEMPLOYMENT, FISCAL UNCERTAINTY? Is your practice SUFFERING a DROP in Client Flow? Are your Revenues FLAT or worse…declining? ...

Good news is: Nancy Cavey and I are hosting a NEW 2-DAY workshop experience called “7 Figure SSD Practice Blueprint” intended ONLY for lawyers who SERIOUSLY desire to take advantage of (and profit from) an aging workforce and the current downturn in the economy by adding (or improving) their social security disability profit center. ...

And it’s NOT about how much you know about substantive SSD law or how long you’ve been practicing. Once you hear the STRATEGIES Nancy and I reveal during this seminar, your practice and your financial future will SOAR as you’ve always dreamed. ...

Here are just some of the powerful strategies you’ll discover at this “one-time-only” event this September:

• Why almost everything you’ve been told about SSD is DEAD WRONG
• CAUTIONARY RED FLAGS you MUST correct BEFORE EVER considering a SSD Practice
• How to double your profits with the same amount of time, money and energy you’re putting into your practice now
• Marketing secrets to attract quality SSD clients without breaking the bank on advertising
• A simple (Yet Powerful) strategy which Positions you as the SSD expert in your area
• How to positively influence the minds of your clients, and instantly increase client engagement rates
• The exact clients to target (and which to avoid!) which will help you sustain a lucrative SSD practice
• The basics of SSD law and how to manage claims in a way that is cost-effective and less time consuming for you and your staff.
• Easy ways to automate and systematize your firm to enjoy a steady income stream which feels virtually effortless and runs on autopilot
• Effective marketing strategies designed to attract a consistent flow of new prospects each and every month
• How to obtain the income levels you desire without sacrificing your personal and family life. ...

      Why would I post this? Because it's so absurd! If these folks have the secret to easy riches why would they share them with others? Why wouldn't they just keep expanding? Why would they need such a ridiculously lurid come-on to get people to cough up $1,000 to listen to them?
     The reality is that there are enormous barriers to entry into Social Security practice and serious risks once you get there. The money isn't that wonderful and it's unstable in the best of times and these are not the best of times. Unless you really want to help people, you're likely to find Social Security practice unfulfilling.
     As I've said before, if you think representing Social Security claimants is the fast track to wealth, consider the fact that it's rare for a Social Security employee to leave employment with the agency to begin a Social Security practice. If it were easy, wouldn't Social Security employees be leaving en masse? If you still think it's easy, come join us and see if she still feel the same way in a couple of years.

Dayton Backlogs Draw Senator's Attention

     From the Dayton Daily News:

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown’s state director met in Columbus on Wednesday with regional officials from the Social Security Administration to discuss how to reduce the local backlog of appeals for disability benefits, following a Dayton Daily News story on processing delays.

In a July 30 article, the Daily News reported that the Social Security Administration’s Dayton hearing office in the last two fiscal years was the second slowest in the nation for processing appeals for benefits. Even though the office has improved wait times — this year it has not ranked among the 20 slowest in the country — Brown said more must be done to reduce the delays further.

Ammunition Purchases Attract Attention

     I have posted in the past about Social Security's large scale purchases of ammunition -- yes, ammunition. These ammunition purchases are now attracting attention from Business Insider: Military and Defense but, really it's all over the blogosphere. Just do a search on Google Blog Search for "Social Security ammunition." I received e-mails from five different people yesterday giving me a link to stories about this. This is spreading fast.
     Why would Social Security buy 174,000 rounds of .357 magnum hollow point ammunition?  That's vicious stuff. What's next, rocket propelled grenades? Armored personnel carriers? Black helicopters?
     This is nothing to get paranoid about. It's for target practice for Social Security's Office of Inspector General (OIG). Years ago OIG had a website that proudly featured a photo of their huge cache of firearms. They really wanted to play up the G-man aspect of their work even though crime isn't that big a part of what they do and the crime they deal with is almost never violent. It's more like dealing with some pathetic soul who stuffed his deceased mother into a freezer so that he could continue to collect her Social Security benefits. Arrest them. Convict them. Send them away to prison. But don't pretend you're dealing with a Mexican drug cartel. OIG can easily call upon other law enforcement agencies to help when they are required to deal with people who might be armed. That ridiculous photo of OIG's arms cache is long gone from the OIG website but the attitude seems to remain. Should taxpayers be subsidizing this sort of fantasy? How many OIG employees really need to make regular visits to the firing range? I'm guessing it's not nearly enough to justify purchasing 174,000 rounds of high powered ammunition. Waste can happen even at OIG but who do you ask to investigate when it's OIG that's wasting money and inciting paranoia?

     Update: OIG has responded. 

     Further update: Fox News is jumping to OIG's defense.