Masks No Longer Required In Federal Offices

      From Government Executive:

Following the new public health guidance issued last week, the White House said fully vaccinated federal employees, contractors and visitors are no longer required to wear masks in federal buildings. 

The Office of Management and Budget sent all federal agencies an email to supplement the updated guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday, which said vaccinated individuals do not need masks outside and in most indoor settings ... 

“For now, this change related to masking is the only change to federal workplace COVID-19 safety guidance – maximum telework and workplace occupancy limits remain in place – but we will continue to update based on public health guidance,” said OMB’s message. “If you are not fully vaccinated (at least two weeks past your final dose), please continue to wear a mask consistent with the requirements set forth in your agency workplace safety plan.”  ... 

“OMB, through the President’s Management Council, with [the Office of Personnel Management] and [General Services Administration], will continue to work with your agencies on the planning already underway related to the federal personnel policies and work environment for after it is safe for increased return of federal workers to the physical workplace,” said the email ...

People Just Won't Behave Like Jason Fichnter Wants Them To

      Jason Fichtner is a mainstream Republican economist specializing in retirement issues. He worked at Social Security during the George W. Bush Administration. He's been associated with the Mercatus Center, a Koch brothers financed think tank. He's recently put out a "White Paper" on Creating A New Retirement Security Framework.  Fichtner identifies real problems. Traditional defined benefit retirement plans are going, going, gone. People aren't saving much for retirement. The money they do save isn't generating much safe retirement income because interest rates are so low. Annuities would help some but people are suspicious of them. Delaying going on Social Security would help but most folks don't wait until full retirement age much less until age 70. Social Security has long term financing problems. What are Fichtner's solutions: Try harder to persuade people to delay going on Social Security retirement benefits and try harder to persuade people to use annuities for retirement income.

     I think that Fichtner's solution to the problems he identifies are completely inadequate. In fact, I'd call them almost useless. We're not going to change people's retirement behavior in fundamental ways. People already have plenty of encouragement to retire later but they just don't want to. If people don't like annuities, they don't like annuities. You're not going to harangue people into liking annuities.

     I see only one workable solution to the problems that Fichtner identifies -- beef up Social Security. Improve its long term financing. Increase its benefits significantly.  That would work. Why can't Fichtner bring himself to mention improving Social Security even as a possibility? The man has on right wing blinders. He can't see the obvious because it doesn't fit into his ideology.

Andrew Saul Happy To Be Back In The Room Again

      From the Wall Street Journal:

... For the first time since the pandemic, Sotheby’s invited a few dozen collectors and dealers to bid in person rather than by phone or online during live streamed auctions. ...

Longtime collector Andrew Saul, commissioner of the Social Security Administration, arrived in a dark suit and peach tie and took a spot on the second row, thumbing through the miniature catalog left in his seat. He didn’t bid but showed up because he said, “It feels so good to be back in the room again.” ...

The Cry Isn’t Dying Down

      Ralph de Juliis, the head of the Union local that represents most Social Social employees, has penned an op ed for the Baltimore Sun on his favorite subject, the need to get rid of Andrew Saul as Commissioner of Social Security.  He’s not the only one who feels that way.

$200,000 Embezzlement Of Social Security Benefits

      From a press release:

Acting United States Attorney Jennifer Arbittier Williams announced that Jonnel Perkins, 43, of Philadelphia, PA, pleaded guilty to the charge of embezzlement by a bank employee.

According to court documents filed today, the defendant was employed as a Retail Relationship Banker at a bank located in Philadelphia. While she was employed in this position, the Social Security Administration (SSA) conducted a routine audit which identified that a customer of the bank branch where Perkins worked was likely deceased but still receiving monthly electronic benefits from the SSA. The SSA suspended the payments to this account, but due to regulation had to wait seven years before the approximately $200,000 in accumulated benefit overpayments by the SSA could be reclaimed.

In the months prior to the time when the reclamation could be initiated, between June and December 2019, Perkins withdrew all of the funds from this dormant account. A subsequent investigation determined that the customer whose account from which the defendant withdrew funds had been deceased since 1999. ...

A Poll Just For Those Who Represent Social Security Claimants

 

find bike trails

Not Much Happening At Social Security Subcommittee

      The following is a list of the Subcommittees of the House Ways and Means Committee and the number of hearings they've held since the beginning of this Congress in January:

• Health -- 2
  

• Oversight -- 3
  

• Social Security -- 0
  

• Select Revenue Measures -- 2
  

• Trade -- 2
  

• Worker & Family Support -- 2

Liberal Overcaution May Cause Employee Resistance To Reopening Social Security Offices

      From The Atlantic:

Lurking among the jubilant Americans venturing back out to bars and planning their summer-wedding travel is a different group: liberals who aren’t quite ready to let go of pandemic restrictions. For this subset, diligence against COVID-19 remains an expression of political identity—even when that means overestimating the disease’s risks or setting limits far more strict than what public-health guidelines permit. In surveys, Democrats express more worry about the pandemic than Republicans do. People who describe themselves as “very liberal” are distinctly anxious. This spring, after the vaccine rollout had started, a third of very liberal people were “very concerned” about becoming seriously ill from COVID-19, compared with a quarter of both liberals and moderates, according to a study conducted by the University of North Carolina political scientist Marc Hetherington. And 43 percent of very liberal respondents believed that getting the coronavirus would have a “very bad” effect on their life, compared with a third of liberals and moderates. ...

For many progressives, extreme vigilance was in part about opposing Donald Trump. Some of this reaction was born of deeply felt frustration with how he handled the pandemic. It could also be knee-jerk. “If he said, ‘Keep schools open,’ then, well, we’re going to do everything in our power to keep schools closed,” Monica Gandhi, a professor of medicine at UC San Francisco, told me. Gandhi describes herself as “left of left,” but has alienated some of her ideological peers because she has advocated for policies such as reopening schools and establishing a clear timeline for the end of mask mandates. “We went the other way, in an extreme way, against Trump’s politicization,” Gandhi said. ...

“Those who are vaccinated on the left seem to think overcaution now is the way to go, which is making people on the right question the effectiveness of the vaccines,” Gandhi told me. Public figures and policy makers who try to dictate others’ behavior without any scientific justification for doing so erode trust in public health and make people less willing to take useful precautions. The marginal gains of staying shut down might not justify the potential backlash. ...

      It's obvious that CDC guidelines will change rapidly over the next three months. Let's not fight the science because we're still mad with Donald Trump. We can't keep cowering in fear forever.

     If you're one who believes that we need to remain cloistered even after we're fully vaccinated and the CDC says we can start to resume normal life, what's your endgame? What will be enough to persuade you that it's safe to eat in restaurants, travel, visit in person with family and friends, return to normal workplaces, etc? 

     Covid-19 will never completely go away. The vaccines who have are extremely effective. Like influenza, meningitis, salmonella and other infectious diseases Covid-19 will always be some threat but the world is full of potential threats.