2020 Social Security And SSI Rates And Limits

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These Stories Are Becoming Too Common

     From a press release:

A former Social Security Administration (SSA) employee pleaded guilty today to a federal criminal charge for stealing more than $176,000 in Social Security benefits designated for elderly and disabled beneficiaries.

Rowena Isabel Lokeni, 36, of Garden Grove, pleaded guilty today to one count of wire fraud. Lokeni was hired as an SSA service representative in 2008 and worked in the administration’s field office in Fountain Valley. She resigned from SSA shortly after her September 6 arrest on a federal grand jury indictment in this matter.

From her work cubicle, between April 2017 and August 2019, Lokeni accessed the SSA computer databases and queried the records of 10 Social Security beneficiaries, according to her plea agreement. Once she accessed the victims’ records, Lokeni fraudulently changed each victim’s direct deposit bank account and routing numbers to instead reflect her personal bank account’s routing and account numbers, the plea agreement states. ...

United States District Judge John F. Walter has scheduled a January 6, 2020 sentencing hearing, at which time Lokeni will face a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison. ...

1.6% COLA

     It's official. Social Security's Cost Of Living Adjustment (COLA) will be 1.6%. It was 2.8% last year.

Overtime Hours Down But OHO Backlog Continues To Decline

     This report on operations of the Office of Hearings Operations (OHO), mistakenly identified here by its old acronym, ODAR, was obtained from the Social Security Administration by the National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) and published in its newsletter, which is not available online to non-members.

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$446,000 Employee Fraud Scheme

     From a press release:

Martin Hernandez, 45, of Selma [CA], pleaded guilty on Monday to one count of wire fraud in connection with a scheme to fraudulently obtain unauthorized Social Security benefit payments, U.S. Attorney McGregor W. Scott announced.

According to court documents, Hernandez met Social Security benefit recipients through his employment at the Social Security Administration. Hernandez recruited certain recipients to receive fraudulent payments in addition to the benefits that they were entitled to receive. These recipients agreed to return a substantial amount of the money they received from the fraudulent payments back to Hernandez. Hernandez electronically initiated the payments from his workstation at the Social Security Administration offices where he worked. After Hernandez caused the beneficiaries to receive the fraudulent overpayments, he would instruct them to meet him in person to give him cash. During the course of the scheme, Hernandez caused the Social Security Administration to make unauthorized payments of over $446,000. ...

No, I Don't Know Why She Hasn't Been Approved But Even If She Is Approved, It Won't Be Enough To Live On

     From the Philadelphia Inquirer:

The pair are homeless. Currently, she sleeps in a bed at Chester County Hospital, while Don sleeps in the chair next to her. Medicaid covers hospital costs. They survive on $350 a month in food stamps, and whatever cash and gas money for Don’s father’s old car, a 2005 Nissan Altima, that friends, Chester County churches, and charitable strangers can give. ...

While Maureen has suffered through three years of chemotherapy, radiation, and other treatments, Don — who once earned $53,000 a year selling parts for BMWs — has been laid off twice, and now devotes his time to caring for his wife and looking for a part-time job.

The couple have applied for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) for Maureen, but have been denied by the federal government three times. SSI, which amounts to about $770 a month, is given to disabled and destitute people who can’t work. Despite a mythology that has grown around the program — that payments are easily obtained by cheating the system — approximately two-thirds of applicants are turned down, federal figures show. ...

Doctors have said Maureen might live a year or less, as cancer has ravaged one breast and lodged in the other. The disease has further metastasized to her lungs and her liver.

“This is a sad case, a sad case,” said Jan Leaf, executive director of the Lord’s Pantry of Downingtown food bank, which offers the Walls food, and has bought them a hot plate so Maureen can eat vegetables. "To see people who worked all their lives, just to end up in this situation ... .

COLA Announcement Coming On October 10

     The big announcement of Social Security's Cost Of Living Adjustment (COLA) is coming up on October 10. Expect it to be 1.5% or 1.6%.

Tide Has Turned

     The Wall Street Journal says that policy debates about Social Security have shifted from cutting benefits to raising benefits. Looking back, it’s hard to understand we’ve spent so many years listening to talking heads telling us we have to cut benefits. That’s never been what people wanted.

     I remember years ago reading this imagined exchange between a Republican member of Congress and a Democratic member:

Republican: All you do is tax and spend.
Democrat: And elect and elect