Social Security Administration Keeps Claimants In The Dark.

(Commissioner Michael Astrue)

Social Security Administration Keeps Claimants In The Dark.

Today’s unprecedented economic crisis is bringing into sharp focus Social Security’s role as the backbone of the country’s retirement security, as well as the irresponsibility of former President George W. Bush’s policies in regard to this critical program.

 

Part of the Bush legacy that Astrue has continued are personnel and labor relations policies that hobble agency staff and undermine SSA’s ability to fulfill its duty to the American public. For example, Commissioner Astrue has implemented a policy prohibiting SSA employees from advising SSA claimants regarding their benefit election options. Because benefit election options, such as month of election, impact the eventual amount of benefits received, this prohibition deprives SSA claimants of advice and information

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socialNsecurity

http://www.amazon.com/socialNsecurity-Confessions-Social-Security-Judge/dp/1449569757

 

This is the ultimate insider's guide to the Social Security Disability Determination System. This book explains the Five Step Disability Evaluation Process and attempts to explain why the System does not work as it was intended. It describes the rules, regulations, exceptions, and court decisions that determine the outcome of an application for disability benefits. This is not another "how to" book about filing for Social Security disability benefits. This book is about how the system works. It concerns the nature of the Social Security Disability Determination process. Written by a veteran Social Security Judge this book will simplify the process and make the Social Security Disability Process work for you.

 

Have you ever wondered how to get Social Security Disability benefits or why your application was denied? 

 

Whether you are an attorney representing claimants or a claimant trying to act as your own representative, this book will show you how to prevail and collect the benefits to which you are entitled. 

 

Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) are the two largest Federal assistance programs that provide financial support to those with disabilities. To qualify for benefits, you must meet specific medical criteria outlined by the Social Security Administration (SSA).

 

The application process can be extremely complicated and confusing.

 

Have you ever asked yourself:

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At last a book is available that explains the Social Security Disability Determination Process in plain English.
This is the ultimate insider's guide to the Social Security Disability Determination System. This book explains the Five Step Disability Evaluation Process and attempts to explain why the System does not work as it was intended. It describes the rules, regulations, exceptions, and court decisions that determine the outcome of an application for disability benefits. This is not another "how to" book about filing for Social Security disability benefits. This book is about how the system works. It concerns the nature of the Social Security Disability Determination process. Written by a veteran Social Security Judge this book will simplify the process and make the Social Security Disability Process work for you.

Have you ever wondered how to get Social Security Disability benefits or why your application was denied?

Whether you are an attorney representing claimants or a claimant trying to act as your own representative, this book will show you how to prevail and collect the benefits to which you are entitled.

Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) are the two largest Federal assistance programs that provide financial support to those with disabilities. To qualify for benefits, you must meet specific medical criteria outlined by the Social Security Administration (SSA).

The application process can be extremely complicated and confusing.

Have you ever asked yourself:
Who is eligible for Social Security Disability Benefits?


Can I apply for Social Security Disability or SSI?

How could I increase my chance of winning Disability and/or SSI benefits?

How much money would I receive in monthly payments?

Can I work and receive Social Security Disability Payments?

Is my family entitled to Social Security Disability benefits?

What diseases are considered for Social Security Disability benefits and SSI?

Do I have to hire a lawyer?

www.judgelondonsteverson.com
https://www.createspace.com/3406851
--

Billions for War, But Not A Penny For Seniors.

As if voters don't have enough to be angry about this election year, the government is expected to announce this week that more than 58 million Social Security recipients will go through another year without an increase in their monthly benefits.

It would mark only the second year without an increase since automatic adjustments for inflation were adopted in 1975. The first year was this year.

"If you're the ruling party, this is not the sort of thing you want to have happening two weeks before an election," said Andrew Biggs, a former deputy commissioner at the Social Security Administration and now a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.

The cost-of-living adjustments, or COLAs, are automatically set each year by an inflation measure that was adopted by Congress back in the 1970s. Based on inflation so far this year, the trustees who oversee Social Security project there will be no COLA for 2011.

This announcement about Social Security benefits raises more immediate concerns for older Americans whose savings and home values still haven't recovered from the financial collapse: Many haven't had a raise since January 2009, and they won't be getting one until at least January 2012.

"While people aren't getting COLAs they certainly feel like they're falling further and further behind, particularly in this economy," said David Certner, AARP's legislative policy director. "People are very reliant on Social Security as a major portion of their income and, quite frankly, they have counted on the COLA over the years."

Social Security was the primary source of income for 64 percent of retirees who got benefits in 2008, according to the Social Security Administration. A third relied on Social Security for at least 90 percent of their income.

A little more than 58.7 million people receive Social Security or Supplemental Security Income. The average Social Security benefit is about $1,072 a month.

Seniors prepared to cut back on everything from food to charitable donations to whiskey as word spread Monday that they will have to wait until at least 2012 to see their Social Security checks increase.

The government is expected to announce this week that more than 58 million Social Security recipients will go through a second straight year without an increase in monthly benefits. This year was the first without an increase since automatic adjustments for inflation started in 1975.

"I think it's disgusting," said Paul McNeil, 69, a retired state worker from Warwick, R.I., who said his food and utility costs have gone up, but his income has not. He lamented decisions by lawmakers that he said do not favor seniors.

"They've got this idea that they've got to save money and basically they want to take it out of the people that will give them the least resistance," he said.

Cost-of-living adjustments are automatically set by a measure adopted by Congress in the 1970s that orders raises based on the Consumer Price Index, which measures inflation. If inflation is negative, as in 2009 and 2010, payments remain unchanged.

Still, seniors like McNeil said they'll be thinking about the issue when they go to vote, and experts said the news comes at a bad time for Democrats already facing potentially big losses in November. Seniors are the most loyal of voters, and their support is especially important during midterm elections, when turnout is generally lower.

"If you're the ruling party, this is not the sort of thing you want to have happening two weeks before an election," said Andrew Biggs, a former deputy commissioner at the Social Security Administration and now a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.

At St. Andrews Estates North, a Boca Raton retirement community, seniors largely took the news in stride, saying they don't blame Washington for the lack of an increase. Most are also collecting pensions or other income, but even so, they prepared to tighten their belts.

Bette Baldwin won't be able to travel or help her children as much. Dorcas Eppright will give less to charity. Jack Dawson will buy cheap whiskey instead of his beloved Canadian Club.

"For people who have worked their whole life and tried to scrimp and save and try to provide for themselves," said Baldwin, a 63-year-old retired teacher, "it's difficult to see that support system might not sustain you."

Baldwin and her husband mapped out their retirements, carefully calculating their income based on their pensions and Social Security checks. Trouble is, they expected an annual cost-of-living increase.

When we cut back, we're cutting back on niceties," Baldwin said. "But there are other people that don't have anything to cut back on. They're cutting back on food and shelter."

Many at St. Andrews said the cost-of-living decision won't affect who they vote for next month. But seniors tied the Social Security issue to what they see as a larger societal problem with debt, entitlements and hopefulness for the future.

"I'm kind of glad in a way," Stella Wehrly, an 86-year-old retired secretary, said of the freeze. "One thing depends on the other and when people aren't working there's not enough people feeding into the Social Security system."

Wehrly and her husband, Hank, said curtailing government spending is necessary to maintain the Social Security system.

"We have a generation now that we're not going to leave a very good legacy for," she said.

Jack Dawson, 77, said the freeze is the right move considering the state of the government and the American economy.

"Who would be surprised what's happened?" he asked. "I feel this is the right decision in light of the malaise."

More than 58.7 million people rely on Social Security checks that average $1,072 monthly. It was the primary source of income for 64 percent of retirees who got benefits in 2008; one-third relied on Social Security for at least 90 percent of their income.

At the Phoenix Knits yarn shop in Phoenix, 73-year-old owner Pat McCartney said she already worries about paying for utilities, groceries and gas. Not having the increase makes her worry even more.

"If I have any major expense, I don't know what I'll do," McCartney said while helping customers with their knitting. "I live on Social Security."

In Kansas City, Mo., Georgia Hollman, 80, said Social Security is her sole source of income. She would have liked a bigger check, but said she's grateful for what she gets.

"There isn't nothing I can do about it but live with it," she said. "Whatever they give us is what we have to take. I'm thankful we get that little bit."

Advocates for seniors argue the Consumer Price Index doesn't adequately weigh the costs that most affect older adults, particularly medical care and housing.

"The existing COLA formula does not account for the economic reality of the true costs that most seniors faced," said Fernando Torres-Gil, director of UCLA's Center for Policy Research on Aging and the first person appointed to the governmental post of assistant secretary for aging, during the Clinton administration.

Still, Torres-Gil said the political reality is different, and many feel seniors are lucky to have their checks determined by the CPI, instead of some new formula that might make it even harder to secure a raise.

"We may just lucky to keep the current index," he said.
(AP)

Social Security Checks Sent to The Dead.

SOCIAL SECURITY SENT 72,000 Checks To Dead People.

A new report from the Social Security Office of the Inspector General says that the agency sent nearly 89,000 checks for $250 each to people who were dead or in prison. The payments were part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Of those who got checks, 71,668 – which totaled $18 million – went to people who had died. Incarcerated people received 17,348 checks, which added up to $4.3 million.

Some inmates were eligible to receive the payments because they'd been receiving Social Security before being locked up.


About half of the payments have been returned, but the Inspector General does not have the authority to attempt to find and take back the balance of them.

As part of the Obama's stimulus plan, a check was sent to a Maryland woman who died more than 40 years ago.


The woman's son, 83-year-old James Hagner, said he got the surprise when he checked his mailbox late last week.


"It shocked me and I laughed all at the same time," Hagner said. "I don't even expect to get one my own self, and I get one for my mother for 43 years ago?"


His mother, Rose, died on Memorial Day in 1967. Hagner said he'd like to frame it and hang it on his wall.


"I just want to keep it as a souvenir, that's all. I'll never cash it," Hagner said.

The reported noted that the Administration was not entirely at fault:

These conditions occurred because SSA (1) was unaware of beneficiary deaths and incarcerations that were reported after it had certified the ERPs, (2) relied on questionable data in its payment records, and (3) did not review all available records, such as the Numident for death information and Prisoner Update Processing System (PUPS) for beneficiary incarcerations.

In response to the report, Social Security Administration press person Mark Lassiter said: "Inaccurate payments are unacceptable".

That statement is not likely to put down the firestorm of criticism that will come from the press, the Congress and taxpayers. The sums of the mistake are relatively small compared to the cost of most programs, but as there is more talk about the damage that the deficit will have on the economy and future generations. The inefficiency of the federal government will come under more scrutiny.

The release of the information could hardly come at a worse time. Republicans are likely to seize on the report as an example of what is wrong with a federal government controlled by Democrats. It is the kind of information that people can hardly help but talk about incessantly.

The Social Security Administration has continued to pay millions of dollars in benefits to dead Americans, and other elderly U.S. residents are at risk of losing badly needed aid because they’re improperly recorded as deceased, federal investigators warn.

The consequences of either bureaucratic error can be severe.
“The addition of erroneous death entries can lead to benefit termination, cause severe financial hardship and distress to affected individuals,” investigators with the Social Security Administration’s Office of Inspector General noted in the report, which was quietly released recently.

The mistakes cost taxpayers and individual beneficiaries in different ways. Taxpayers are losing money when benefits are paid to the deceased. Individuals get into trouble when they’re prematurely pronounced dead.

In Southern California and elsewhere last year, investigators analyzed 305 Social Security beneficiaries who were recorded as deceased in their Social Security Administration files. At least 140 of them were still alive.

All told, investigators say, more than 6,000 current Social Security beneficiaries are recorded as being deceased.

In 1962, Lockheed Corp. charged the government $34,560 for 54 toilet covers or $640 each. The covers were meant for use on Navy ships. The story still circulates around Washington as an example of government waste and lack of oversight of expenses. To the legend of the toilet seat can now be added the legend of the checks to the dead.

MSPB FY 2009 Appeals Processing Results.

MSPB FY 2009 Appeals Processing Results

Just in case anyone was interested -

The track record of your odds at getting an adverse agency decision reversed before the Merit Systems Protection Board. (MSPB).

The 2009 stats were release, and here is what they say:

Of the total of 7,998 decisions filed, only 174 resulted in the MSPB overturning the decision of the Agency.


The MSPB recently published its FY 2009 Annual
Report containing summaries of significant Board
decisions and detailed case processing results. The MSPB
issued 7,998 total decisions in FY 2009.

Significant Board decisions addressed issues such as MSPB appeals
procedures, alternative personnel systems, discrimination,
retirement, suitability, the Whistleblower Protection
Act, and veterans' rights under the Veterans
Employment Opportunities and Uniformed
Services Employment and Reemployment
Rights Acts.


MSPB's regional and field offices issued
almost 7,000 decisions with an average
processing time of 83 days. Of those, almost
56 percent (3,485 cases) were dismissed—
usually for lack of jurisdiction or timeliness.
MSPB's settlement and mediation programs provided an
opportunity for the parties to reach mutually acceptable
resolutions to their cases. As a result, almost 62 percent
of the remaining 2,780 appeals (1,720 cases) were settled
by the parties, meaning that MSPB did not rule on those
cases. Of the 1,060 appeals that were adjudicated on the
merits, 81 percent (859 cases) of the agencies' decisions
were affirmed, 16 percent (174 cases) were reversed and 2
percent (23 cases) were mitigated.


At headquarters, the Board issued 1,027 decisions
with an average processing time of 94 days or less. Of
the 850 decisions on Petition for Review (PFR) of Initial
Decisions issued by the Board, 79 percent (668 cases)
were denied, almost 10 percent (80 cases) were granted,
almost 6 percent (47 cases) were denied but reopened by
the Board, and less than 7 percent (55 cases)
were settled or dismissed. Of the 127 cases
that were reviewed by the Board, 49 percent
(62 cases) were remanded for reconsideration,
35 percent (44 cases) were affirmed, 7 percent
(9 cases) were reversed, and the remaining 9
percent of cases had other outcomes.


In addition, MSPB continues to issue legally supportable decisions, as evidenced
by the fact that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal
Circuit left unchanged (dismissed or affirmed) over
90 percent of MSPB decisions that were appealed to
the Court. These results indicate that MSPB continues
to ensure that the Federal workforce has access to lots of
due process but very little justice.

Social Security: Example of gov't rigor mortis.

Social Security: Example of gov't rigor mortis

Keeping government limited is a practical approach to governing that opens the door to growth and prosperity.

Why?

Consider a fundamental difference between business and government. Any businessman operating successfully is in touch with reality, with change, and acts with speed to make adjustments necessary to survive.

Businesses are not democracies, so a CEO can execute what needs to be done on the spot.

Government is the opposite. It is allergic to change. They say government programs are like headless nails. Once in, they're impossible to get out. Programs produce interests who then fight change.

So it should be obvious that if we want a nation that is vibrant, in touch with reality, changing as it needs to in a timely way, the reach of government must be limited.

Consider Social Security.

With annual expenditures almost 5 percent of the total U.S. budget, it's the single largest government spending program.

With a program of this magnitude, that impacts practically every working American, you'd think it would be a priority to keep it healthy and in tune with the times.

But it's just the opposite. It's the so called "third rail." Politicians don't want to touch it or talk about it. They don't want to upset anyone with the truth that the system is not just broken, but way out of touch with today's realities.

Social Security passed in 1935. Although there have been changes in the way of tax increases and expansions of the program, Social Security is essentially the same system as was passed 75 years ago.

Can you imagine any business still using a system that is 75 years old?

It's really older. If you go on the website of the Social Security Administration, it will tell you that the idea for Social Security originated with German Chancellor Otto Von Bismarck in 1889.

Here's just a few ways that our world has changed since 1935:

Our population has aged. In 1935, there were 16 working Americans paying payroll taxes to cover each retired American. Today there are only three working per retiree.

Americans are retiring earlier and living longer. In 1950, the median male retirement age and male life expectancy were about the same – 66. By 2005, the median retirement age for men was under 62 and the median male life expectancy was over 75.

Work habits and attitudes have changed dramatically. In 1973, 50 percent of the private sector male work force had been with the same employer for at least 10 years. By 2006, this dropped to 35 percent. The percentage with the same employer for at least 20 years dropped from 35 percent in 1973 to 20 percent in 2006.

We live today in an age of the Internet, global markets and increased individual mobility.

And the promise we get from our leaders is that they will save and preserve a system that was conceived 120 years ago and enacted here 75 years ago. This is leadership?

Not only is our Social Security system unsuited to our times, it is bankrupt. It went into a deficit situation this year and its overall unfunded liabilities – the total amount promised less the total amount for which there is funding – is almost $20 trillion.

In a recent Gallup Poll, 60 percent of working Americans said they don't expect to get their Social Security benefits. And in a recent Pew poll, 58 percent favored the idea of individuals keeping a portion of their Social Security taxes and investing it in a private retirement account.

We'll hear from Washington that to save this dinosaur, we must pay more taxes and retire later. In other words, we'd have a better deal keeping our taxes and putting them in our mattress.

Wake up, Washington. It's not 1935. It's 2010. If we don't get leaders who'll look reality in the eye, tell us the truth and retrofit out nation for the time in which we live, we won't have a nation.



(© 2010 by Star Parker)

The Merit System Protection Board Never Finds Discrimination.

MSPB Continues to Refine Discrimination Analysis


It’s been a running joke, and for the employee’s bar not so much of a joke, that federal sector employment lawyers, HR folks, etc., really didn’t need to spend any time learning about the MSPB’s view of discrimination law for the simple reason that the Board never finds discrimination anyway. Could that be about to change? We’re still not seeing findings of discrimination from the MSPB, but suddenly it has an increased focused on the analysis of discrimination cases by its administrative judges. See Disparate Treatment by Any Other Name, Vol. I, Issue XV (2010).

The latest addition to the Board’s discrimination repetoire is Hodge v. Department of Homeland Security, 2010 MSPB 190 (September 15, 2010). In Hodge, the Board reversed the indefinite suspension of a Deportation Officer finding that an investigation into alleged misconduct was not sufficient reason to sustain the suspension where the agency did not rely on the crime provision of 5 USC 7513(b)(1). Having already reversed the suspension, the Board then went on to analyze the appellant’s claim of discrimination and the finding of the administrative judge that the appellant had failed to present a prima facie case of discrimination.

Because the case had gone to hearing, the Board found that the judge erred in analyzing whether the appellant had presented a prima facie case. Instead, the Board found that the judge should have simply proceeded to analyze whether the appellant had established that the agency’s reason for the indefinite suspension was pretextual. The Board cites Jackson v. U.S. Postal Service, 79 MSPR 46 (1998) for the proposition that when evidence has already been taken on a discrimination claim, it is error to analyze whether the appellant has presented a prima facie case and the analysis should proceed directly to the issue of pretext. The Board’s certainly correct about its own case law, but the reality is that the Board is simply following the dictates of the U.S. Supreme Court in U.S. Postal Service Board of Governors v. Aikens, 460 U.S. 711 (1983).

As Jackson duly notes, in Aikens the Supreme Court found that “[w]here the defendant has done everything required of him if the plaintiff had properly made our a prima facie case, whether the plaintiff really did so is no longer relevant[;] [t]he district court has before it all the evidence it needs to decide whether ‘the defendant intentionally discriminated against the plaintiff.’”

Of course, none of this helped the appellant in Hodge as the Board found there was insufficient evidence of pretext. The Board found:

[T]he appellant allegedly was involved in an incident with New Orleans police officers wherein she challenged their authority when they asked her to leave a car wash, resisted arrest, refused their attempts to handcuff her, and struck one of them in the face with her fist. IAF, Tab 4, Subtab 4(d) at 1. The misconduct of the three comparator employees consisted, respectively, of: being intoxicated and firing his weapon; having an affair with the wife of a man who was the subject of an investigation; and being the subject of domestic violence charges filed against him by the comparator’s wife. See Hearing Transcript at 120-21, 124. The conduct of the comparator employees clearly conflicts less directly with the duties of a law enforcement officer than the appellant’s direct and public confrontation with other law enforcement officers.

So, maybe we’re going to start seeing findings of discrimination out of the Board. On the other hand, one has to wonder. Is the conduct of the appellant in Hodge really less compatible with being a law enforcement than getting drunk and firing a weapon, having an affair with the spouse of someone who’s the subject of an investigation, and being charged with domestic violence? Hmm . . . perhaps it’s a good thing that the Board doesn’t get to hire law enforcement officers and only gets to decide on their discipline.
(By Ernest Hadley)

FELTG is a limited liability company EIN # 27-2532251, DUNS # 007097332
All content © 2010 by Federal Employment Law Training Group - Wellfleet, MA

Social Security Administration Wrongfully Withheld $500 Million in Disability Benefits

$500 Million in Suspended Disability Benefits Returned
The Social Security Administration wrongfully denied eligible beneficiaries because they believed that the applicants were wanted felons.

A federal court that decided for Martinez vs. Astrue ordered the Social Security Administration to return $500 million worth of suspended benefits to approximately 250,000 beneficiaries. The beneficiaries, who were wrongly identified as felons, were deemed ineligible through an arrest warrant database. They were consequently denied of their benefits for the last 10 years.

Gerald A. McIntyre, the lead attorney for the National Senior Citizen Law Center, logged the class action after discovering that many beneficiaries were being cut off when the SSA erroneously applied a 1996 law which prevented fleeing felons from collecting benefits. The suit was initiated in 2008 when Rosa Martinez, 53, a resident of Redwood City, CA, stopped receiving disability assistance because of a 1980 arrest warrant filed in Miami, FL. However, Martinez has never visited Miami. Martinez said, “They just told me I won’t be getting any more Social Security because I committed a crime in 1980...I was in a state of shock. And since then I became really sad and upset because I didn’t know what was happening to me. I was depending on this money.” Martinez became the lead plaintiff in the class suit. Likewise, many of the other victims shared similar names with known felons; others had warrants for minor infractions.

The SSA's warrant filtering procedure was supposed to ensure that fleeing felons cannot get disability benefits. McIntyre, on his reproach, said, “The vast majority of class members were not fleeing at all; many never knew that criminal charges were pending against them let alone that a warrant had been issued.” McIntyre also criticized the SSA's method of matching the first and last names of the beneficiaries with Social Security Numbers. “If they cannot discover a match, they will dig by using dates of birth.” The policy is still subsisting in selected parts of the United States.

SSA Commissioner Michael Astrue announced that they are currently mailing notices to the victims, informing them that they may reapply for benefits and submit a disability claim within the next six months. Under the terms of the settlement, in which the administration admitted no wrongdoing, the government is only repaying benefits owed, and will not be paying any punitive damages for loss of income or suffering.

Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) is a federal insurance program of the United States government that is funded by payroll taxes and is designed to provide an income for disabled individuals who are unable to work. If you are one of its rightful beneficiaries who received unfair or negative treatment, never sleep on your rights. Visit https://socialsecurity-disability.org for more information about SSDI.