WSJ Refutes WSJ Claims

     From Media Matters:


A Wall Street Journal article debunked the myth that federal
disability benefits are to blame for the shrinking labor force,
"exaggerated" claims that have previously been pushed by the paper
itself.


An April 29 Journal article headlined "Real Culprit Behind Smaller Workforce: Age" explained that the recent decrease
in the labor force -- the number of employed

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ALJ Union Continues To Make Friends And Influence People

     From the opening statement of Representative Sam Johnson (R-TX), the chairman of the House Social Security Subcommittee at a hearing last week:


... I was outraged to
learn that the union which represents Administrative Law Judges has just
filed a lawsuit in federal court asking for an injunction against
Social Security’s guidelines for judges to handle 500 to 700 cases a
year.   

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Hall Wins Award

     Stephanie J. Hall (no relation), Deputy Commissioner for Quality Performance at Social Security, is a 2012 Meritorious Executive Winner in the Presidential Rank Award Program.

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Missouri Tries To Subpoena OIG Employee

     From the Springfield, MO News-Leader:


The Social Security investigator at the center of the controversy
involving the concealed carry information of thousands of Missourians
was subpoenaed Friday by the Missouri Senate.

The
Senate issued the subpoena to Special Agent Keith Schilb with the
Office of the Inspector General of the Social Security Administration,
according to a news

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Getting On Disability For A "Self-Made Diagnosis"

     From syndicated columnist Froma Harrop:


We who work through colds, bad backs and low moods — however liberal we
might be — have permission to resent those who could hold a job but
don’t, preferring to collect disability checks...

More than 5 percent of eligible American adults are now receiving
disability payments from Social Security. Twenty years ago, it was 3
percent. One reason

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This Is Only A Drill

     From the Baltimore Sun:


An emergency drill at the Woodlawn-based Social Security
Administration is likely to cause traffic delays Friday near Security
Boulevard and Woodlawn Drive.

Most employees from the Security West building will be evacuated from
the facilities during the drill. The public is encouraged to take a
different route to avoid delays. The drill will take place in the

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Study On Effects Of Great Recession On Disability Claims

     From the abstract of a study done by Norma Coe and Matthew Rutledge for the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College:


Much as in previous recessions, the number of applications to public
disability insurance programs increased sharply during the Great
Recession.  We find that the composition of applicants also changes
across business cycles.  For example, applicants during

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Cato Isn't Expecting Privatization

     Giving us an idea how the right wing views their chances of privatizing Social Security, Daniel Mitchell of the Cato Institute writes that that Australia's privatized Social Security system would be a great model for the U.S. All it will take for such a thing to happen in the U.S. is "some sort of Greek-style fiscal meltdown that led to a societal collapse." In a footnote, Mitchell says he

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Inspector Javert Is Alive And Well And Working At Social Security

     From the State Journal-Register of Springfield, IL:


About 50 years ago, Harry and Gladys Samonds owned Ferrell’s Corner, a
tavern, and the Illini Court Motel at Clear Lake and Dirksen.  Harry was
pretty well-known in Springfield when he died in 1969. He left behind
Gladys and his son, Mike, at their home on Ridge Avenue.

Mike was only 15 when his father died. As a minor, he qualified

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Retirement Of Nancy Shor

     The following is a message just sent out by the President of the National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) to NOSSCR members: 


Nancy Shor, our long-time Executive Director, has advised the Board of her decision to step down as Executive Director. I am pleased that she will continue with NOSSCR during this transition and that she will be staying on in

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ALJ Assignments Now Shown On Hearing Office Status Report

     Social Security's Hearing Office Status Report in the ERE system now shows the name of the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) to whom a pending request for hearing has been assigned. This is done not merely for cases that have been scheduled for hearing. Most of mine with a request for hearing date after the middle of July 2012 have an assigned ALJ even those most of these clients will not have

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Examining That NPR Series

     From a press release:


Online now and airing this Sunday at 5:30 p.m. (April 21) on the Philadelphia CNN-News affiliate WFMZ-TV, The American Law Journal presents "Social Security Disability-
Unfit for Work?" examining a March 22, 2013 National Public Radio
broadcast of "This American Life" that according to panelists on the
program has drawn both staunch praise and heavy criticism.

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Is It Wrong For A State To Do This?

     From the New Hampshire Union-Leader:


Four years ago, in the depths of the Great
Recession, staffers in the state Division of Family Assistance started
to notice that people were applying for disability income through the
state, but not following through with their federal applications."In
2009, we began asking the question: Are we maximizing federal revenue
in our state programs?"

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Ever Wonder How It Was That Social Security Started Compiling Lists Of The Most Popular Baby Names?

     From The Atlantic:


In 1997, Michael Shackleford was an employee of the Office of the
Actuary at the Social Security Administration's headquarters in
Baltimore; his wife was pregnant and he was determined to avoid giving
the child a common name like his own. With his access to Social Security
card data, he wrote a simple program to sort the information by year of
birth, gender, and

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Social Security Subcommittee Hearing Announced

     From a press release issued by the Social Security Subcommittee scheduling a hearing for 9:30 on Friday, April 26:


As the nation ages, the SSA will continue to face unprecedented service
delivery demands even as it moves to automate many of its core
functions. With Congress and the President agreeing on nearly static
annual SSA budgets for the last three years, along with tight

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ALJ Union Sues Agency On Workload Issues

     From the Associated Press:


Judges struggling to handle a surge of
disability cases sometimes award benefits they might otherwise deny in
order to clear cases faster so they can meet quotas imposed by the
Social Security Administration, according to a lawsuit filed by the
union representing the agency's administrative law judges.


The
Social Security Administration says judges should

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NPR Gets Some Responses

     National Public Radio isn't admitting they made mistakes in their series of radio pieces on the Social Security disability programs but they are showing on their website some of the responses that they have received. It's quite an impressive list. They seem to be proud of having generated a response.

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You Ought To Read That Radical Disability Benefits Reform Act Of 1984

     In right wing explanations for the increase in the number of people drawing Social Security disability benefits you read again and again that the Disability Benefits Reform Act (DBRA) of 1984 is the problem. Supposedly, DBRA was a dramatic loosening of standards that allowed untold numbers of healthy people to get on benefits due to alleged musculoskeletal and mental disorders.

     The

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I Had It Backwards

     I had posted earlier that Social Security's databases would allow one to identify many of those in this country most impaired by mental illness. I thought that this information might be used to prevent those mentally impaired individuals from obtaining guns. My post was somewhat confirmed by the fact that Social Security has a representative on an eight member White House working group on

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Second Mistrial In Social Security Guard Stabbing Case

     From the Chatham, VA Star-Tribune:




A Gretna man accused of stabbing a Social Security office guard
remains in custody after a second jury trial ended in a mistrial
Thursday.




Byron Clements, 50, was charged with one count of aggravated
malicious wounding for allegedly stabbing Jason Alsbaugh several times
at the Social Security Administration office in

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Why Did Social Security Want Missouri Conceal-Carry Records?

     From KBLA in Missouri:


The Missouri Department of Revenue is looking for a new Director.

Brian
Long resigned Monday after weeks of controversy surrounding the
scanning of documents for driver’s license and conceal-carry weapons
applicants. The pressure increased last week when it was discovered that
the agency compiled the entire list of the state’s 163-thousand CCW holders for the

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I Agree With Andrew Biggs

     Andrew Biggs, former Deputy Commissioner of Social Security and long time warrior in the (losing) battle to privatize Social Security, has a surprising blog post. He opposes chained CPI, describing it as "bad policy that both liberals and conservatives may come to regret." His post is brief and directs readers to a longer piece he wrote for the National Review but the link he gives is bad.

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The Overwhelming Majority Of Disability Claims Get Denied At The Initial And Reconsideration Levels

     From the newsletter (not available online) of the National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) -- click twice on image to view full size:

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A Satellite Office Closes

     From West Hawaii Today:


For the last time in the foreseeable future, the Social Security
Administration offered satellite office hours in Kona Tuesday morning.

Social
Security employees began calling West Hawaii residents in to the West
Hawaii Civic Center’s community room at about 9:30 a.m. By just after 10
a.m., more than 120 people were signed up to use the services. ...

Last

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Big Employee Fraud Case In Alabama

     The Associated Press reports that Manuel Chaney III, who had worked at Social Security's Bessemer, AL field office, has been sentenced to 70 months in prison for an identity theft scheme. Chaney had used information obtained from his employment to identify people who had recently died. It's not clear from the article exactly what he did thereafter. He may have filed survivor claims on

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Can Pain Be Measured?

     From the New England Journal of Medicine:


Persistent pain is measured by means of self-report, the sole reliance
on which hampers diagnosis and treatment. Functional magnetic resonance
imaging (fMRI) holds promise for identifying objective measures of pain,
but brain measures that are sensitive and specific to physical pain
have not yet been identified. ...

In study 1, the neurologic

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Yeah, I Kinda Thought So

     From Taegan Goddard's Political Wire:


[National Republican Campaign Committee] Chairman Greg Walden (R-OR) touched a nerve when he savaged the
entitlement changes in President Obama's budget as a "shocking attack on
seniors," Roll Call reports. But "it's the lack of fallout" that may be more revealing. The
debate Walden's remarks "has set off inside the GOP shows many
Republicans

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NOSSCR Issues Press Release To Combat Attacks On Social Security Disability Programs

     The National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives has put out a press release on the "dramatic, sensationalized media reports about the Social Security
Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI)
programs, based on anecdotes, half-truths and misrepresentation of facts."

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Chained CPI Proposal Creates Republican Disgreement

     From the Chicago Tribune:


President Obama's proposal to trim Social Security's cost-of-living
adjustments has sparked not only Democratic outrage, but Republican
confusion.


In the days since Obama put the idea in his 2014 budget, Republicans'
reactions have included support, opposition and refusal to commit. The
proposal was once a mainstay of the GOP's deficit-reduction overtures

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One Republican Seems To Like Chained CPI

     From a House Ways and Means Committee press release (emphasis in original):


U.S. Congressman Sam Johnson (R-TX), Chairman of the House Committee on
Ways and Means Subcommittee on Social Security, today announced the
first in a series of hearings on the President’s and other bipartisan
entitlement reform proposals.  This hearing will focus on using the
Chained Consumer Price Index to

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CNN Money On Increase In Disability Claims

    There's a piece in CNN Money on the increase in the number of disability claims. It's not as unbalanced an article as most but the author still lists the recession first as a causes for the increase. The idea that economics explains anything and everything has gotten so strong in the minds of so many people that it's hard to get them to look at the compelling evidence that demographics is

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Thoughts On Reviewing A 1374 Page File

     It hit me yesterday afternoon that critics of Social Security's disability determination process have little idea what is involved in the process. There seems to be an eagerness to jump to the conclusion that almost anyone who says they are disabled is found disabled. In the view of these critics, it's nothing but thinly disguised unemployment benefits. These critics are told this by

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A First Look At The President's Budget For SSA

     The President's recommended budget for fiscal year (FY) 2014, which begins on October 1, 2013, provides for a 7% increase in administrative funding for the agency over FY 2012 and "Establishes a dependable source of funding for Continuing Disability Reviews and Supplemental Security Income Redeterminations." I don't yet know what is meant by a "dependable source." Chained CPI is in the

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A Spring Haiku

     Former Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue submitted the following haiku via twitter to an NPR show that was celebrating National Poetry Month:


Early April. 

Winter drums cold tunes. 

The old word pile sheds its slush. 

What burns is unseen.

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I Know! Public Service Jobs. That's The Answer!

     From Joe Klein writing in his blog at Time:


Back during the presidential campaign, Mitt Romney tried to make the
argument that President Obam was soft on welfare reform. He missed the
target. Welfare abuse has shifted to Social Security Disability. ...

Now, to be sure, there are workers who fit the program’s inevitable
intent: older workers who suffer serious injuries and need support

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"Ersatz Unemployment Insurance Or Welfare"

     Charles Lane writing in the Washington Post:


[Disability Insurance Benefits under the Social Security Act] spending has tripled since 1970, relative to the economy’s size, and it now approaches a full percentage point
of gross domestic product. ...

An aging labor force explains some of the
program’s growth; older workers are more likely to become disabled. But a
growing body of

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Kira's Story

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Now We Know What's Wrong With Social Secuity Disability. It's A Case Of Hysteresis!

     From the Wall Street Journal:


The unexpectedly large number of
American workers who piled into the Social Security Administration's
disability program during the recession and its aftermath threatens to
cost the economy tens of billions a year in lost wages and diminished
tax revenues.

Signs of the problem surfaced Friday, in a dismal jobs
report that showed U.S. labor

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Upated Fee Payment Numbers

     Social Security has issued updated numbers on payments of fees
to attorneys and some others for representing Social Security
claimants. These fees are withheld and paid by Social Security but come
out of the back benefits of the claimants involved. The attorneys and
others who have their fees withheld pay a user fee for this privilege. Since these fees are usually
paid at the same time

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Open Letter From Eight Former Social Security Commissioners

April 4, 2013 



An Open Letter from Former Commissioners of the Social Security Administration 



     As former Commissioners of the Social Security Administration (SSA), we write to express our
significant concerns regarding a series recently aired on This American Life, All Things Considered, and National Public Radio stations across the U.S. ("Unfit for Work: The Startling Rise of

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Astrue On MSNBC

     Michael Astrue was on the Chris Hayes show on MSNBC tonight arguing with some highly-opionated but poorly informed critic of Social Security disability. I'll try to find a link to the video.

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Chained CPI And Disability Change Expected In Obama Budget

     From today's NY Times:

President Obama next week will take the political risk of formally proposing cuts to Social Security and Medicare
in his annual budget in an effort to demonstrate his willingness to
compromise with Republicans and revive prospects for a long-term
deficit-reduction deal, administration officials say. ...

Mr. Obama’s budget
will propose a new inflation formula

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DOMA Being Declared Unconstitutional May Only Be The Beginning

      From Liz Goodwin writing at Yahoo News:


If, as many legal experts predict, the Defense of Marriage Act is struck
down by the Supreme Court, advocates behind the decadeslong movement
for gay rights will have won a major victory. But the decision could
also create a dense legal maze for gay and lesbian married couples, one
that would surely lead to more lawsuits that could make their

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Who Would Have Thought?

     From an Op Ed in the Baltimore Sun:

The government in Britain recently did something interesting.


It asked everyone receiving an "incapacity benefit" -- a disability
program slowly being phased out under new reforms -- to submit to a
medical test to confirm they were too disabled to work. A third of
recipients (878,000 people) didn't even bother and dropped out of the
program rather

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Not Going To Happen Soon But Are You Sure It Won't Happen In The Next Ten Years?

     From the Washington Post's Wonkblog:


...[A] big new report (pdf)
from the New America Foundation suggests that the conventional wisdom
is exactly backward. Congress should be looking at ways to expand
Social Security, not shrink it — particularly at a time when
traditional corporate pensions are disappearing, and 401(k)s have proved
fairly risky.

The major proposal in the report is

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The Irony

     From the Atlantic Wire:


Conservative columnists are newly outraged by Social Security data showing a rise in disability applications. But this isn't Obama's fault. In fact, it's kind of theirs....

Notice when the big application spike happened — 2009 or 2010. Now,
subtract 65 from that number. 2010 minus 65 years equals 1945. The year
the Second World War ended. And the year that the

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"The Real-World Workplace Is Still Tougher Than It Looks From The Faculty Lounge"

     From Michael Hiltzik writing in the Los Angeles Times:


...Social Security disability, has a bull's-eye on its back — and not for the first time. ...
[T]here's almost no doubt that the disability program's trust fund will
run out in 2016, three years from now. At that point, absent
congressional action, disability payments will have to be cut by about
20%. 


"The insolvency of DI

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Responses To NPR Disability Reporting

     The Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities (CCD), the major umbrella organization protecting the rights and promoting the interests of the disabled, has issued a response to last week's series of pieces on National Public Radio on Social Security disability benefits. I'd like to post some excerpts from the CCD response but for some technical reason I can't cut and paste from the CCD

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Wonkblog Keeps On Wonking

    The Washington Post's Wonkblog has discovered to its surprise that, contrary to what some people have been telling them, demographics is by far the most important factor in explaining the increase in the number of Social Security disability claims. Wonkblog concedes that this simple, straightforward explanation might have some merit but they can't believe that's all there is to it. I would

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Exciting News

     Google has a new service coming to your computer soon.

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More Photos Showing The Sorry State Of Service At Social Security Field Offices

     When Carolyn Colvin testified recently before the House Appropriations Committee her prepared remarks included a photo of a line outside her agency's field office in Miami. I posted that photo on this blog. However, there was an appendix to her prepared remarks that I hadn't seen. That appendix has been posted at a Social Security website. It contains the following additional photos:


The

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