About Time! Congressional Hearing On Customer Service At Social Security

     The House Social Security Subcommittee has FINALLY scheduled a hearing on Strengthening Social Security’s Customer Service for Thursday, May 17 at 2:00 EDT. Witnesses will be announced later.

    Now, if we could just get the House Appropriations Committee to also schedule a hearing, I'd be happier. Ways and Means Committee can provide publicity but better management isn't going to make an appreciable difference in service at Social Security. That's going to take money and the Appropriations Committee holds the key to that. (Of course, I'd also be happy to see Senate Finance Committee and Senate Appropriations Committee hearings!)

How Does It Feel?

online polls

Employee Viewpoint Survey

     The federal Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has issued its Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey for 2021. Over 11,000 Social Security employees responded. The survey results are reported in dozens of tables. I didn't see anything that jumped off the page. Overall, Social Security employees seem less happy than federal employees in general but not strikingly so. Take a look and tell us what you think.

Social Security Bulletin

     Social Security has posted the most recent issue of the Social Security Bulletin, the agency's  scholarly publication. It includes a study which asks "What Is the Relationship Between Socioeconomic Deprivation and Child Supplemental Security Income Participation?"

    Here are a couple of charts from that study:

Click on images to view full size

Support For Allowing NHC ALJs To Unionize

    From Government Executive:

A group of Democratic senators have revisited a long-dormant effort to broaden the bargaining unit of administrative law judges at the Social Security Administration, buoyed by recent guidance from the Biden administration aimed at encouraging collective bargaining at federal agencies.

In 2007, then-Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue created the agency’s National Hearing Center, a cadre of administrative law judges who would parachute into regions with a long backlog of disability claims, but he left the component’s employees outside of the ALJ bargaining unit at the Office of Hearing Operations, which is represented by the Association of Administrative Law Judges.

In 2011, the Federal Labor Relations Authority sided with Astrue, finding that although National Hearing Center judges had nearly identical job duties, they were management officials because they supervised decision writers. That said, the FLRA also found that the agency committed unfair labor practices by exhibiting hostility toward the union and failing to notify the group of the component’s creation.

In a letter to Acting Social Security Commissioner Kilolo Kijakazi last month, five Democratic senators, led by Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, urged the agency to consider classifying judges in the National Hearing Center as bargaining unit employees and granting them access to the Association of Administrative Law Judges. They cited the fact that in the years since the FLRA’s decision, the differences in the responsibilities of ALJs in both agency components have disappeared. ...

    Bad grammar in that first sentence! Tut, tut, tut

Conn Documentary Available On Apple TV+

From SK POP:

Apple TV+'s The Big Conn, a four-part docuseries, is set to explore the shocking real-life tale of Eric C. Conn. ...

Apple TV+ will release all four episodes together - May 6 at 3.00 am, Eastern Time (ET). In conjunction with the series, Apple will also release an exclusive companion podcast that will go into further depth into Conn's deception and his extravagant lifestyle, including new interviews and behind-the-scenes insights. ...

    My understanding is that this documentary will also focus on the real pain left behind for Conn's former clients who have ended up being harshly punished for Conn's misdeeds even though they did nothing wrong.

Most Popular Baby Names

     Social Security has released its list of most popular baby names for 2021:

Boys	Girls
1.     Liam	1.  Olivia
2.     Noah	2.  Emma
3.     Oliver	3.  Charlotte
4.     Elijah	4.  Amelia
5.     James	5.  Ava
6.     William	6.  Sophia
7.     Benjamin	7.  Isabella
8.     Lucas	8.  Mia
9.     Henry	9. Evelyn
10.  Theodore	10. Harper

    And here's the list of the fastest rising names for girls and boys in 2021:

Boys	Girls
1.     Amiri	1.  Raya
2.     Eliam	2.  Wrenley
3.     Colter	3.  Angelique
4.     Ozzy	4.  Vida
5.     Loyal	5.  Emberlynn

     I'm generally in the "What's in a name?" camp when it comes to names but all I can say after looking at the fastest rising list is "Yuck!"

NADE Newsletter

     The National Association of Disability Examiners (NADE), a voluntary organization of personnel who make initial and reconsideration determinations on disability claims for the Social Security Administration, has released its Spring 2022 newsletter. Almost all NADE members work for state governments who handle disability determination for Social Security at the first two levels of review. The states do the work under contract with Social Security. I won't bother explaining why states do this work but it goes back to the very beginning of disability determination for Social Security.

    There's a lot more in this newsletter that will be of interest beyond the NADE membership but here's a little nugget from a summary of a presentation by Grace Kim, Deputy Commissioner of Operations and some other SSA officials at NADE's mid-year meeting, "... to date in FY22, the [Disability Determination Service employee] attrition rate has increased in the examiner positions from 19.8% last fiscal year and is on track to hit 24.4% this fiscal year. ..." That is a staggeringly high turnover rate. I'm an employer. I don't know how you get complex work done with that high a turnover rate -- and yes, disability examiners do complex work. This is a big red flag telling us that something is very wrong and needs urgent attention.