Disability Law Blog

Notes from a Social Security Seminar

The NC Academy of Trial Lawyers held a Social Security Practice seminar last Friday, December 9^th, at which Glenn Sklar, Assistant Commissioner, Office of Disability and Income Security Programs (ODISP), spoke.  (The ODISP is the "principal advisor to the Commissioner of Social Security on program policy issues and is involved in strategic planning, policy development, and analysis of SSA program policy.") These are a few of my impressions of Mr. Sklar's remarks.  Take them for what they are:

• Mr. Sklar is a cheerful person who seems to enjoy his work.

• The Commissioner is a Woman of Action. She will issue the Final Rule on the new approach within months, not years. She is committed to making the new approach a reality. (Nancy Schorr (NS) also spoke at the conference. She believes we could see the Final Rule as early as February 2006. She says Region 1 (New England) will be the first region to operate under the new regs. )
• Mr. Sklar says the C is focused on three areas in the NPRM: the submission of evidence rules, the reopening provisions and the AC. Most of the 800+ comments addressed these sections of the NPRM. We can expect some changes in the Final Rule, at least in these areas.

• For those of us who think the RO is a bad idea, tough luck. Sklar says not many comments on this, the implication being that the proposal is non-controversial and thus acceptable.

The RO is hailed as the linchpin of the new approach although, for the life of me, I can’t understand why.  As I said in my comments on the NPRM, the C’s overarching goal of the right decision as early as in the process as possible should mean that reconsideration is really and truly eliminated and that a claimant who is denied initially should get a hearing in front of an ALJ as soon as possible. Why wait? A hearing not only serves the C’s overarching goal but it gets the claimant before another human being who actually makes a credibility assessment, something that DDS doesn’t do and the RO won’t do. And that can be the difference between winning and losing. So take the time and money saved by eliminating reconsideration, beef up the senior staff attorney position at OHA, allow them to make favorable OTRs and give the more difficult cases to the ALJs. Simpler, faster and cheaper. But, of course, a complete non-starter.

The C has decided that the RO is the magic bullet that solves her decisional inconsistency problems.  However, since the DDS allows about 1/3 of new claims and that doesn't appear likely to change under the new proposals, decisional consistency will logically mean more affirmations at the RO level, and more reversals at the DRB level.  (NS likes to call the DRB the "DRAB." I suspect our clients may find DRUB a more fitting description. )

One gets the feeling from Mr. Sklar’s presentation that some of the time limits regarding submission of evidence will be tweaked but they’re not going away. The reopening provisions may be retained but new and material evidence as a basis for reopening will be much more constricted. The AC seems well and truly dead in the water. Finally, while NS spoke about the NPRM on the age creep proposal and the deadline for submitting comments (1/3/06, btw), there was no call to arms. It, too, feels like a done deal.

You only have to look as far as the C’s recent NPRM on changing the age categories to know where the C’s heart really is. It’s with the money. Her uber-goal is to save the disability program billions of dollars over the next 5-10 years at the expense of the people the program is supposed to serve.  This is called "stewardship."   Why else would you propose the elimination of reopening and the change in age categories?  These changes have nothing to do with the right decision as early in the process as possible.  They have everything to do with money.

The upshot of all this is that the C is about to deliver a devastating one-two punch to the Body Politic of the disability insurance program. And it's of the iron-fist-in-a-velvet-glove variety.   We should be realistic about the future of the disability program. It’s bleak.

Subcommittee Announces Joint Hearing on Commissioner's Proposed Changes to Disability Process

Subcommittees of the House Ways and Means Committee have announced a joint hearing to "examine Commissioner Barnhart’s proposed regulations for the disability determination process and new return-to-work demonstration projects." 

The hearing will be held Tuesday, September 27th and comments are solicited:

Chairman [Wally] Herger [R-CA] stated, “The Social Security disability determination process has long been in need of improvement. I applaud Commissioner Barnhart for taking a serious look at the current process and developing a well thought-out proposal. I am interested in hearing her thoughts as well as the comments of organizations and individuals involved in the disability determination process.”

Voinovich Proposes Lock Box for Social Security

via MarketWatch:

Republican Sen. George Voinovich on Monday unveiled legislation to create a "lockbox" that would forbid the federal government from using Social Security revenues for any purpose other than paying benefits.

The Ohio lawmaker's proposed "Truth in Budgeting Act" would also prevent the government from raiding any trust fund to spend money on other programs.

Voinovich said that the measure would force policy-makers to make choices between significant spending cuts, higher taxes or increased borrowing. Such a choice would be likely to force Washington to take steps to put its fiscal house in order, he added.

A Little Night Music on the Current State of Social Security Privatization

Michael Hiltzik, a Pultizer Prize winning business columnist for the Los Angeles Times, is guest blogging at the Washington Monthly and deconstructs a US News & World Report article extolling the President's bravery in pushing Social Security privatization.

Social Security Benefit Calculators Produce Widely Divergent Results

USAToday has an article comparing the results of different Social Security benefits calculators available on the internet. The considerable variation in calculated results is directly related to the underlying assumptions made about the economy's performance. Bear in mind, the rosy results produced by the calculators from the more conservative groups are based on economic assumptions that, if true, would eliminate the long-term fiscal problems of Social Security without any change in the existing program.

Citizen Prof: Michael Meeropol & the Defense of Social Security

Fascinating article about Michael Meeropol, the son of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, now a professor of economics and a reformed radical, who discusses his reasons for opposing the phase-out of Social Security. An excerpt:

I asked him what it was that got him motivated. "Because I'm just so infuriated," he responded. "I'm so infuriated at two things. I'm infuriated at the bald-faced dishonesty of the politicians who are pushing this. But I'm always infuriated about that. My first adult activism was against the war in Indo-China, and the thing that got me the most infuriated -- probably stupid to say it -- was the lying involved. What I should have been most infuriated about was the killing. But as sort of a citizen, I was particularly offended by the lying and then, as time went on, I was particularly upset by people's willingness to believe lies. ... So I've always been somebody who really couldn't stand lies. And particularly lies told by intellectuals.

"The other part of it was that as somebody who has studied this, and read about it and taught about it for over 30 years, I know the issues and I know that a lot of people with economics, or business, or political science degrees are wittingly or unwittingly spreading disinformation. And if I don't respond to it, then I leave the field."

A long but interesting read.

Source: The Valley Advocate

Debate About Whether Social Security is in Crisis

Excerpts from a recent debate on social security between New York Times columnist and Princeton economist Paul Krugman, Michael Tanner of the CATO Institute and Josh Micah Marshall of TalkingPointsMemo.com.

Transcript here; video here.

Senator Tom Harkin on Privatization and Social Security Disability Benefits

Senator Tom Harkin (D. Iowa), in this op-ed piece, focuses on the disconnect between the President's words and the facts he uses to support them:

President Bush's Commission to Strengthen Social Security devoted just two pages in its 256-page final report to the topic of disability benefits, despite the fact these payments account for 17 percent of all Social Security expenditures. The commission urged the president to initiate a "separate policy development process'' to address the disability program, but he opted not to touch this hot potato.

The problem is that all the commission's budget projections assume that disability benefits will be cut the same as retirement benefits. In the commission's final report, according to the Associated Press, "disability benefits get reduced along with retiree benefits, in some cases up to 46 percent. The cuts were used to make the plan's finances add up in the report.''

In short, if disability benefits do not get cut, the transition costs of Social Security privatization - already estimated at $4.5 trillion over 20 years - become even more prohibitive.

Yet the President says that his plan will not affect disability benefits. Harkin continues: "Currently, people receiving Social Security disability benefits switch over to Social Security retirement benefits when they reach age 67. The switch is seamless because benefits in the two programs are the same. But what happens when retirement benefits have been cut by 30 percent to 50 percent under privatization? Will people with disabilities be held harmless? If so, where is the plan to make this possible?"

AFGE Decries "Irresponsbile Rhetoric" of the Social Security Trustees

It's no secret that the Bush Administration has enlisted the services of the Social Security Administration to promote its political agenda. The recent report of the Social Security trustees continues the trend, and the President of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) responded to the report in a recent press release:

Today's news conference continues the disturbing trend within the Social Security Administration (SSA) to employ the use of irresponsible rhetoric to scare the American public about the future of Social Security. It seems as though the trustees did not bother to look over the latest projections, which show the outlook for Social Security holding more or less steady following the strong gains made in recent reports. The trustees speak of certain doom even though their own report shows three divergent scenarios and despite the fact that, obviously, the future cannot be known. . . .

No one should be surprised by what we are hearing from the trustees considering the administration's 60/60 tour, the involvement of SSA Deputy Commissioner James Lockhart in the town hall meeting road show, and the alignment of public trustee Thomas Savings with the pro-privatization group Progress for America. Because of this conflict of interest, AFGE has called upon Savings to resign. American taxpayers should not tolerate information that is misrepresented and ethically questionable.

Will LTD Insurers Have Access to SS Disability E-Files?

An article in the National Underwriter touts the advantages of the E-Dib initiative for long-term disabilty (LTD) insurers, including "instantaneous confirmations of a person's status on SS disabilty claim" and "faster recovery of LTD overpayments." The underlying assumption of the article is that LTD insurers will have access to SS files "with the proper authorization and access codes."

A difficult problem in the LTD claims process is determining the status of a DIB claim. While the SSA has made attempts at providing online files in the past, the results have been difficult to work with, and generally unsatisfactory. If the electronic file process is successful, it should provide remote access to claim files for parties with the proper authorization and access codes.

Such access would permit an insurer to view online, and without delay, the status of a DIB claim. Indeed, it would allow an insurer to determine if a DIB claim had been filed by the disabled worker.

Such knowledge would help an insurer determine whether the disabled worker is performing his or her obligations under the LTD contract. The LTD contract generally requires a disabled worker to apply for DIB and to pursue the application through an administrative hearing. . .

Similar advances in technology may also permit the insurer to recover any “overpayments” more quickly than currently possible.

Another angle to consider as e-dib ramps up.

SSA's Take on Privatization

The Social Security Administration answers your questions about private investment v. paying Social Security tax:

Why can't I invest my Social Security taxes into an IRA plan?

Question: I think I could do better if you let me invest the Social Security I pay into an Individual Retirement Plan (IRA) or some other investment plan. What do you think?

Answer: Maybe you could, but then again, maybe your investments wouldn't work out. Remember these facts:

• Your Social Security taxes pay for potential disability and survivors benefits as well as for retirement benefits;
• Social Security incorporates social goals - such as giving more protection to families and to low income workers - that are not part of private pension plans; and
• Social Security benefits are adjusted yearly for increases in the cost-of-living - a feature not present in many private plans.

Pretty straightforward.

Source: Guest on the Connect board

Succinct Anti-Phase-out Editorial

From the editorial page of the The Tomah Journal:

Social Security is, first and foremost, an anti-poverty program. It doesn't exist so that retirees can take cruises or pass on an inheritance; it exists so that elderly poor and disabled have enough to eat. Social Security benefits are calculated on a progressive basis; the poor get back a higher percentage of their contributions than the affluent, and it's a benefit that never runs out. It's instructive that the President rarely mentions disability and survivors benefits as he attempts to sell privatization.

Bush's plan does have the potential of bringing more money into the system by allowing private accounts to invest in the stock market. However, private accounts aren't necessary to capture stock market returns. The existing system could invest a small portion of its portfolio in an index fund and keep the same progressive benefits formula. The main impact of private accounts would be to redirect benefits from poorer to richer beneficiaries and generate billions in fees for the financial services industry.

A program as successful as Social Security doesn't need an overhaul, it needs public officials who believe in the concept of social insurance. . . . George W. Bush doesn't.

The Problems with Disability Insurance in President's Privatization Plan

A short article in the New York Times by Alan B. Krueger, Professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University, discusses the Social Security disabliity program and privatization:

Integrating the disability program into a system of personal accounts is complicated because it is inherently an insurance program. Disabled beneficiaries take out far more from the system than they put in. Workers collectively insure the risk of disability. It is inconceivable that personal accounts could fulfill this role. Moreover, only about a quarter of workers have employer-provided long-term disability insurance, so it is unlikely that the private sector could provide adequate insurance by itself.

Support Privatization: Remember, we're all in this alone!

Mark Shields gets it:

One barbed line making the political rounds addresses the administration's plan to pay for its proposed reform of the nation's public retirement system by cutting future benefits: "President Bush's reform means taking the security out of Social Security." One corollary of the proposed Social Security overhaul seems to read: "Remember, we're all in this alone."

Mostly overlooked in the emerging debate is the question as to whether the proposed revamping will in fact take the "social" out of Social Security. Social Security is fundamentally a continuing commitment between generations, but Social Security also embodies a profound collective value -- that in the just, humane country we are dedicated to building, the elderly and the disabled ought not to be forced to scratch out a bare existence in poverty.

Source: coloring outside the lines

Roosevelt on Privatization

James Roosevelt Jr., a former associate commissioner of Social Security and the grandson of Franklin D. Roosevelt:

ridiculed the idea that his grandfather, who established Social Security in 1935 to prevent poverty, would back President Bush's proposal to allow younger workers to divert up to two-thirds of their Social Security payroll taxes into personal investment accounts.

"He was all for investment programs; he started out as a Wall Street lawyer," Roosevelt said at the University of New England. "But he also believed . . . that people should be able to count on secure bases of income and retirement so they could have decent food, clothing and housing in their retirement."

Source: The Portland Press Herald

Social Security is Insurance, not an Investment

The Des Moines Register notices the difference:

The debate over Social Security might simmer down a little if everyone understood the program and started calling it by its formal name. It's Old-Age, Survivors and Disability Insurance (OASDI).

Note the word insurance.

Social Security is not a retirement-savings program and was never meant to be. It is insurance, and it's not just for retired people. Iowa Senator Tom Harkin reminded everyone of that last week when he asked how payments to disabled workers would be affected by President Bush's plan to partially privatize Social Security.

No one knows the answer, because plan specifics have not been unveiled.

Currently, about 6.7 million children and spouses of deceased workers are receiving survivors benefits from Social Security. About 7.9 million disabled workers and their families receive benefits.

About 33 million people receive retirement benefits, which are meant to insure against abject poverty in old age, not to provide total retirement luxury.

Because Social Security is an insurance program, it's nonsensical to speak of its "rate of return" as if it were an investment program.

The debate over privatization isn't about strengthening Social Security. It's about transforming it from an insurance program into a savings program.

That's a false choice. For a secure and comfortable retirement, people don't need one or the other. They need both. Security from insurance; comfort from savings.

Myths About African-Americans and Social Security Privatization

The false claim that the Social Security program is unfair to African-Americans is explored by William E. Spriggs, a senior fellow at the Economic Policy Institute in this interesting article. A tidbit for those of us who wonder about how survivor's and disability benefits will be affected by the President's plan:

President Bush's Social Security commission proposed the partial privatization of Social Security retirement accounts, but cautioned that it could not figure out how to maintain equal benefits for the other risk pools. The commission suggested that disability and survivor's benefits would have to be reduced if the privatization plan proceeds.

Why It's Called Social Security

From the Tacoma, Washington News Tribune, David Waters puts his finger on the social covenant that is Social Security:

In the 18th and early 19th centuries, our society chose to send old people with insufficient means to an actual poorhouse. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, we relied on a patchwork system of military, company and state pensions that was inadequate and ineffective, especially after the stock market lost nearly half its value in 1929. The Social Security Act of 1935 was more than a public policy. It was a social covenant.

"This seeking for a greater measure of welfare and happiness does not indicate a change in values," President Franklin Roosevelt said in 1934. "It is rather a return to values lost in the course of our economic development and expansion."

Values that tell us to respect our elders. Values that say people who work all of their lives have earned the right to live all of their "golden years" in dignity and comfort, without fear and with some measure of financial security. Values that hold that a good and godly society is judged by how it cares for "the least of these" - the sick and the poor, widows and orphans, the youngest and the oldest among us.

That's the society we agreed to become in 1935. That's why we called it "Social" Security and not "Personal" Security.

The ownership society that the President seems to cherish doesn't have to be all Me, all the time. There are other values at stake. Thankfully, it appears a majority of Americans still seem to think that good government can operate to secure a "greater measure of welfare and happiness" for the less fortunate among us.  The belief that every-man-is-an-island underlies the rhetoric about phasing-out Social Security.  One hopes that Congress not only rejects the phase-out, but rejects the principle that animates its supporters.

Social Security Phase-Out Bypasses Disability?

Via the Boston Globe:  A long article in yesterday's Globe discusses the disability program in some detail:

While the White House says Bush is not yet focusing on the disability program, some in the disabled community worry that benefit cuts will be applied to both the retirement and disability programs as a way to save money. For example, if the retirement plan benefits are cut by tying payments from the current system of wage indexing to price indexing, as some have proposed, it is unclear whether the same cut would be applied to disability benefits.

In addition, Thomas Sutton, president of the National Organization of Social Security Claimants' Representatives, worries that Bush's plan for private Social Security accounts could hurt people with disabilities. He gave the example of a person who is disabled at age 37 and cannot return to work. That person would receive disability benefits but under the Bush plan would not be contributing to a private account. Upon retirement, that person would not have nearly as much money in a private account as a nondisabled person.

''Those of us who are advocates for the disabled are very concerned about the impact of privatization on the disabled and the survivors of the deceased, who are about one third of the people who receive Social Security benefits," Sutton said.

Josh Marshall on the President's Social Security Phase-Out Plan

This is must reading if you want to understand what's at stake in the President's battle to dismantle Social Security. Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo describes the difference between a defined benefit plan (a guaranteed benefit which is what Social Security provides) and a defined contribution plan (a "benefit" without a guarantee which is what the President wants to do to Social Security).

He nearly beats this distinction to death in making the point that Nicholas Kristof, in this column, doesn't understand what's at stake. Nor do Brit Hume and other Republicans who keep citing President Clinton's call to save Social Security as proof that the Democrats wanted to do what the President now proposes. Clinton wanted the government to try different investment strategies to strengthen Social Security. The government, not private citizens, took the investment risk. The benefits under Clinton's approach remained guaranteed.

Bottom line: There is no security in Social Security under President Bush's proposal. And inevitably, since the President now concedes that his proposal does nothing to solve the problem of adequately funding Social Security, Social Security will be phased out. (Josh also notes that the President's proposal ignores disability and survivor's insurance benefits. How the President intends to keep those programs intact, if indeed he has that intention, no one really knows.)

Thus, the charge that the Democrats don't have a counter-proposal to the President's plan is nonsense. "Getting rid of Social Security or preserving it are not two versions of the same endeavor, even if the distinction is intentionally obscured by the rhetoric of 'reform.' They are opposite objectives. Since President Bush is now trying to do the former nothing is more obvious or logical than that the Democrats are opposing him root and branch since they want to do the latter."

President Silent on the Fate of Disability Benefits in State of the Union Address

Via TalkingPointsMemo:

Keep in mind that nothing that got said last night touched on the very big issues of disability and survivor benefits, which make up a substantial part of Social Security. That is money that in most cases, by definition, gets paid to individuals or on behalf of individuals who didn't have a lifetime of work to build up a private account. Where does that money come from?

And scroll down in Josh's blog a little further and you'll see the President hard at work dissembling:

"Our society has changed in ways the founders of Social Security could not have foreseen. In today's world, people are living longer and therefore drawing benefits longer - and those benefits are scheduled to rise dramatically over the next few decades."

George W. Bush
State of the Union Address
February 2nd, 2005

"In 1934, when Franklin Roosevelt formed the Committee on Economic Security to design what was in effect the first federal safety net, the committee hired three actuaries to stargaze into the future. The actuaries predicted that the proportion of Americans over 65 -- then only 5.4 percent -- would rise to 12.65 percent in 1990, meaning that retiree costs would soar. They were just a tad high; the actual figure would be 12.49 percent."

Roger Lowenstein
New York Times Magazine
January 16th, 2005

The founders foresaw 56 years into the future. The Congressional Budget Office says Social Security can pay guaranteed benefits at least through 2053 without any changes. That's a mere 48 years from now.  Now there's a crisis.  Time for a tax cut.

Press Secretary Says Bush Only Wants to Privatize Retirement Benefits, Not Disability or Survivor's Benefits

From the LA Times (subscription required): Following a meeting between President Bush and 22 black religious and business leaders at which the President asserted that the Social Security retirement program shortchanged blacks, the White House suggests that Bush is only interested in phasing out retirement beneifts.

Rep. William J. Jefferson (D-La.), a Black Caucus member, estimated that 68% of disabled African Americans were kept out of poverty by the current disability benefits, while almost 80% of African Americans 65 and older depended on Social Security for more than half of their income. "Deep cuts in guaranteed retirement, survivors and disability benefits are likely under any plan to privatize Social Security, and African American families cannot afford any cuts due to the disparities in income and unemployment," Jefferson told reporters in a conference call last week. But Bush and his aides made clear Tuesday that they intended to circumvent the caucus and other black Democrats in an aggressive public campaign to build support for their Social Security proposals.White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Bush did not support altering the disability or survivors' benefits of Social Security only the retirement benefits.

McClellan did not explain how under Bush's yet-to-be-announced plan, one can opt for privatization while retaining entitlement to full disability and survivor's benefits.

Another Take on Privatization

Via Unfogged: Hendrik Hertzberg in the New Yorker writes:

The values behind Social Security privatization are not terrible. It is good to save. It is good to be self-reliant. It is good to plan ahead. It is good to be the little pig who builds his house of brick rather than straw.

But it’s not as if these values were not being taught in hundreds of other ways in our lives. And there are other values, too—values that are suggested by the words “social” and “security.” Yes, self-reliance is good; but solidarity is good, too. Looking after yourself is good, but making a firm social decision to banish indigence among the old is also good. Market discipline is good, but it is also good for there to be places where the tyranny of winning and losing does not dominate. Individual choice is good. But making the well-being of the old dependent on the luck or skill of their stock picks or mutual-fund choices is not so good. The idea behind Social Security is not just that old folks should be entitled to comfort regardless of their personal merits. It is that none of us, of any age, should be obliged to live in a society where minimal dignity and the minimal decencies are denied to any of our fellow-citizens at the end of life. “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house”—that’s a good admonition to keep in mind when making social policy. But so is “Honor thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.”

Amen.

Social Security Disability Benefits Could Be Reduced Under Privatization Plan

The Chicago Sun-Times publishes the first article I've seen that connects the President's long term goal of eliminating Social Security retirement benefits with the Social Security disability benefits program:

Retirement and disability benefits are calculated using the same formula, so if future promised retirement benefits are cut, then disability benefits also would be reduced -- unless the program is separated.

That also raises big questions about how investment accounts would be structured for disabled people, especially if they get injured at a young age or are dependent on a parent. Disabled beneficiaries typically work less and need benefits sooner, so the accounts would not provide enough income to these people.

ritThe proper way to deal with this is to essentially make it clear that these are two different programs and to separate the benefit formulas,'' said David John, analyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation.

''One is an insurance program and one is essentially a retirement program,'' John said. ''They have vastly different characteristics, they have vastly different administrative structures.''

But disability advocates argue that the two programs can't be easily separated. Bush wants to let younger workers invest much of their 6.2 percent in payroll taxes into personal investment accounts, similar to a 401(k). Of the tax, 0.9 percentage point funds disability benefits, while the remainder is for retirement benefits.

Article on Social Security Non-Crisis in Sunday's New York Times Magazine

Roger Lowenstein authors perhaps the best piece on the Social Security-crisis-that-isn't in yesterday's New York Times magazine.

PDF v. TIFF (Part II)

In a prior post, I lamented the choice SSA had made to scan all disability claim records into the TIFF image format. I linked to this article that described the advantages of PDF over TIFF. (Here's another link to Adobe's white paper on the use of PDF files by lawyers.) I also added my own interesting comments about the problems I saw with the use of TIFF. Thing is-I never meant to post that post! Here's why.

I don't use Adobe Acrobat software in my own practice and realizing that the article I linked to, and my own take on the situation, might not give an altogether accurate picture of the differences between TIFF and PDF, I ran the post by Charles Martin, a member of NOSSCR's technology committee, a technophile and the author of The Ombudsman practice management software. I asked him to review my post and give me constructive criticism.

In light of his comments (see below), I decided not to post the post. But through the miracle of technology (a setting in my blog software), it got published anyway when I posted a subsequent, unrelated article. I now substitute these comments from Charles Martin which, I believe, give a more accurate picture of the advantages of the PDF format.

The comments are open so if anyone has criticisms, insights, refutations and the like, please share. The TIFF/PDF distinction is significant and the more information we have about it, the better.

Here's Charles Martin's take on TIFF and PDF:

• TIFF files don't have to be any larger, and can even be smaller than PDF
• Both can be used for copy and paste of the original image, and both can be converted via OCR to text
• SSA's CDs will include Windows software which does some limited OCR of short passages
• Acrobat Pro will open TIFF files, automatically converting them to PDF format
• Adobe owns both TIFF and PDF formats, and is actively updating PDF, but has not updated TIFF for years, and likely never will

The real advantages of PDF over TIFF have nothing to do with the size of the file:

• PDF can store virtually any kind of data
• PDF handles multiple pages better
• PDF handles image scaling better, retaining quality with magnification
• PDFs can have bookmarks to mimic paper tabs many of us use
• PDFs can have notes about documents tied to a specific part of a page
• PDFs can have added hi-lighting which does not change the original
• PDFs can have hyperlinks to other documents, such as the Merck Manual Online
• PDFs can have dictation tied to a specific point in a document
• PDFs can have secure signatures which can verify a document has not been altered
• PDFs can be indexed for rapid and complex searches of a document, or of many documents
• PDFs are universally accepted by the federal courts
• PDFs do lots of other things, too numerous to mention (forms, Javascript, etc.)
• PDFs will have future features no one has yet imagined
• There is a free PDF reader (Adobe Reader) for all types of computers, and even PDAs

I hope this clarifies things a little.  Again, if anyone has more information about the merits of TIFF as the  format of choice for the biggest image database in the world, please share.

Another Take on the Social Security "Crisis"

Joshua Micah Marshall at Talking Points Memo gives Democrats some advice about how to handle the move afoot to privatize Social Security. There's a lot in this post worth reading. An excerpt:

The Social Security "crisis" is manufactured; there is no crisis. To the extent there are long-term financing problems, the president's plan will gravely worsen them. The problem we face isn't over Social Security, which continues to run up huge surpluses (just as it was intended to under the early-80s reform), but that our non-Social Security budget continues to run massive structural deficits. Or rather, it has returned to running massive structural deficits after getting into the black in the late 1990s through the combined exertions of a Democratic president and a Republican congress. Social Security isn't the problem, but rather George W. Bush's reckless fiscal policy.

UPDATE:  Kevin Drum chimes in on the plan to cut SS benefits by indexing future benefit increases to prices instead of wages.

GAO Report: Improvements Could Increase the Usefulness of Electronic Data for Program Oversight in SSA's Disability Programs

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has released a report recommending improvements to the collection of electronic data in SSA's disability programs. GAO concludes:

SSA lacks a comprehensive strategic plan for collecting useful and reliable data for effective oversight and program planning. Despite the fact that the reliability of its data has been an ongoing issue, the agency currently has no specific plans to implement additional front-end data entry controls or for a tracking and feedback system for the back-end verification of the electronic records. In addition, the agency has no specific plans for evaluating whether the types of information it currently collects continue to be useful for program oversight and whether other types of information would contribute to oversight.

The full report is 26 pages in PDF format.

Paul Krugman on the Social Security Crisis That Isn't a Crisis

Taking a break from his break, Paul Krugman returns to say a few words about the privatization of Social Security benefits:

Projections in a recent report by the Congressional Budget Office (which are probably more realistic than the very cautious projections of the Social Security Administration) say that the trust fund will run out in 2052. The system won't become "bankrupt" at that point; even after the trust fund is gone, Social Security revenues will cover 81 percent of the promised benefits. Still, there is a long-run financing problem.

But it's a problem of modest size. The report finds that extending the life of the trust fund into the 22nd century, with no change in benefits, would require additional revenues equal to only 0.54 percent of G.D.P. That's less than 3 percent of federal spending - less than we're currently spending in Iraq. And it's only about one-quarter of the revenue lost each year because of President Bush's tax cuts - roughly equal to the fraction of those cuts that goes to people with incomes over $500,000 a year.

Given these numbers, it's not at all hard to come up with fiscal packages that would secure the retirement program, with no major changes, for generations to come.

Krugman, like so many others, says nothing about the disability program and how it would be financed under a privatized model.

Article III Groupie Interviews Judge Robert W. Gettleman, District Court Judge in the Seventh Circuit

Sometimes the 3-5 readers of this blog (excluding Mom) send us interesting stories or links about life outside our little backwater of the Internet. Here is a missive we recently received from Article III Groupie who writes Underneath Their Robes, a blog that contains--as Article III Groupie describes it -- "news, gossip, and colorful commentary about the federal judiciary."  (Be forewarned: A3G is a mistress of understatement.)

"I was just writing to bring to your attention my recent interview with Judge Robert Gettleman (N.D. Ill.), which some of your readers may find interesting. Judge Gettleman, who overcame polio as a child, had some very thoughtful remarks about how that experience led him to become involved in disability rights issues as a lawyer and how it has affected his work as a judge. He also has some critical remarks about the Supreme Court's ADA precedents."

So particularly for the folks in Illinois who toil away at Social Security appellate work, here is Article III's interview with Judge Gettleman. It's an excellent read. Enjoy!

Hearings Office Processing Times

Over on the Connect board, JOA has posted a list of hearings office processing times--the average time from request for hearing to the date the hearing is held. JOA says these numbers are current as of July 2004. A sample of offices in my region of the country:

• Charleston, SC--7 months


• Charlotte, NC--14 months


• Columbia, SC--14 months


• Greensboro, NC--11 months


• Greenville, SC--14 months


• Raleigh, NC--19 months


• Roanoke, VA--10.5 months

In our experience, Charlotte is currently running about 18 months from request for hearing to hearing.

Ways and Means Subcommittees to Hold Hearing on Social Security Commissioner's Plan to Improve the Disability Process

From a Ways and Means Press Release:

"Congressman Clay Shaw (R-FL), Chairman, Subcommittee on Social Security, and Congressman Wally Herger (R-CA), Chairman, Subcommittee on Human Resources, Committee on Ways and Means, today announced that the Subcommittees will hold a joint hearing on the Commissioner of Social Security’s proposal to improve the disability determination process. The hearing will take place on Thursday, September 30, 2004, in the main Committee hearing room, 1100 Longworth House Office Building, beginning at 1:00 p.m."

. . . In announcing the hearing, Chairman Shaw stated, “Since her term began, Commissioner Barnhart has rightly made improving the disability process one of her top priorities. Her proposal to improve service to individuals with disabilities applying for benefits holds real promise. In the last year, much feedback has been provided to the Commissioner by key stakeholders. This hearing provides the opportunity for us to learn more about the details of that feedback, and how the Commissioner plans to move forward.”

SSA, AFGE at Odds Over Removal of Sexual Orientation Contract Provisions

Via govexec.com:

Social Security Administration officials are trying to remove language protecting employees from discrimination based on sexual orientation from the agency's labor contract, union leaders claim.

During negotiations on renewing the contract, SSA officials proposed eliminating a clause that allows gay, lesbian and bisexual workers to file discrimination grievances, said Witold Skwierczynski, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Council 220.

AFGE officials convinced SSA to add the language to the contract during 2000 negotiations, after President Clinton issued an executive order establishing a uniform policy protecting federal employees from discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Recent Article on Social Security's e-DIB Program

Via FedLawyerGuy:   A June 24, 2004 article in the Washington Post on Commissoner Barnhart's foray into digitizing the disability program. An excerpt:

More than a decade after the Social Security Administration took its first stab at overhauling the disability claims process -- a doomed effort that cost $71 million and took seven years before being abandoned in 1999 -- the agency is at it again.

This time, Social Security Administrator Jo Anne B. Barnhart has vowed to go paperless by 2005 by creating electronic folders for the millions of people who apply for disability benefits each year. The idea is to let the far-flung agencies and doctors that handle the mountains of claims documents do so using common folders online. The agency hopes the effort will save money and ease the crushing case backlogs that have plagued the national disability insurance program for more than a decade.

Commissioner Barnhart Testifies on SSI Program Before House Ways & Means Subcommittee

Commissioner Jo Anne Barnhart testified before the Subcommittee on Human Resources on April 29, 2004.
An excerpt:

"SSI beneficiaries are among the most vulnerable members of our society. All of them are either blind or disabled, or aged 65 and older. All have very limited incomes and little or no assets. The maximum income an individual can have and still be eligible for SSI represents less than 75 percent of the poverty level for a one-person household, and the maximum income a couple can have and remain eligible for SSI represents less than 85 percent of the poverty level for a two-person household. Only 35 percent of SSI beneficiaries receive other cash benefits such as Social Security benefits. It is clear that without SSI, the vast majority of beneficiaries would be destitute. . . .

By any measure, SSI recipients are among the poorest of the poor. For them, SSI is truly the program of last resort and is the safety net that protects them from complete impoverishment. In administering this program we must recognize both the vulnerability of those served by it as well as our obligation to the American taxpayer to ensure that payments made under the program are consistent with the program’s requirements. . . . "

"However, as you know for FY 2004, SSA’s appropriation for administrative expenses was significantly lower than the President’s budget request. I found that I had to balance the need for CDRs [Continuing Disability Reviews] and redeterminations against the need to process claims filed by aged and disabled citizens—arguably the most vulnerable of our population. And we are not going to be able to do as many CDRs and redeterminations as I had originally planned."

Commissioner Barnhart's Testimony Before House Ways & Means Committee

Commissioner Barnhart testified before the House Ways & Means Subcommittee on Social Security on February 26, 2004. An excerpt from her testimony:

With regard to long-term improvements, the last time I appeared before this committee, I announced a new approach for improving the disability determination process. The approach I discussed focuses on making the right decision as early in the process as possible and improving the quality of decisions at all levels of the process. The proposal is predicated on the successful implementation of AeDib, which would allow disability claims and quality reviews to be worked at any location. We are continuing to pursue a collaborative approach in developing the new process as we receive input, comments and ideas from Congress, the public, organizations, advocacy groups and employees to refine the new approach.

Smart Document Solutions Enters Into Development and Pilot Agreement With Social Security Administration

Here's a press release from Smart Document Solutions (SDS) regarding a new agreement to provide medical record services to DDSs:

ATLANTA, Feb. 18 /PRNewswire/ -- Smart Document Solutions ("SDS"), the world's largest healthcare document processor, has signed a development and pilot service agreement with the United States Social Security Administration ("SSA").

Under the terms of the agreement, SDS will develop an interface between the company's SmartScan document workflow platform and SSA's State Disability Determination's Medical Evidence Request System. This system is utilized by every state in an effort to administer the social security benefits application process. SDS currently provides over fifteen million pages of medical evidence annually to the SSA's state departments of Disability Determination. Once the interface is completed, SDS will transmit requested medical records electronically directly to SSA's request system.

John Smart, Chairman and CEO of SDS, stated, "We are proud to be working with the Social Security Administration to improve their internal workflow. Implementation of this interface will result in faster and more economical decisions regarding claims from disabled taxpayers."

"Utilization will begin in May 2004 allowing the SSA to create an electronic, paperless workflow for a large percentage of medical evidence requests," states Jonathan Arkin, Vice President of Business Operations for SDS. "Having the Federal Government select our medical record delivery technology is the ultimate security validation. This agreement is a testament to the progress SDS has made for electronically transferring information securely."

In previous studies with Kentucky and North Carolina, SDS was able to show a dramatic 40-60% reduction in delivery time while saving a significant amount of postage costs for SSA.

October 4, 2001 Confirmation Hearing Video of Commissioner Barnhart

While looking for something else, I ran across this video of Commissioner Barnhart's October 4, 2001 Confirmation Hearing over on C-span. It's nearly 50 minutes long. Although C-span's website says videos stay in the archives less than 15 days, this is still there.

New Budget Cuts Almost 9% from Social Security's IT Funds

Score another victory for supply-side economics. An article in the latest issue of Federal Computer Week says that:

President Bush would cut almost 9 percent from the Social Security Administration's information technology modernization funds.

The administration's budget request released this week asks for $808 million for SSA's various systems modernization projects. The request is almost 9 percent less than the $887 million the Bush administration sought last year.

One IT project facing the prospect of reduced funding is the Accelerated Electronic Disability System, a complex redesign of SSA's disability claims process that will create an electronic folder for each case under review. The project's $103.2 million budget would be reduced to $73.5 million in fiscal 2005.

Looks like huge deficits do matter after all.

SSA Agency Directories Information Updated on SSAS.com

Via Connect:   Peter Young has updated the agency directories page of his website:

Our collection of agency directories has just been updated. . . . As the agency continues to shift to Intranet web applications, the info in these directories will be less frequently updated, and many of them may totally disappear within the next 12-18 months. There are no longer any updates for the Service Area Directory, and the last SAD update was in January 2002

An Acronym for Attorney's Fees

Another Connect posting about codes appearing after the SSN on checks issued to attorney's by SSA.

SSA used to identify attorneys with "AT" after the SSN. The system could show the name of only the most recent attorney. The system was modified a year or two ago. Now all attorney payments begin with the letter S. In simplified terms SA means you were the first attorney paid on that SSN since the new system was implemented. You could be the first attorney and be SB, SC, or higher. If the first attempt to pay the attorney does not work, the authorizer can try to correct the entry (in which case you would still be SA) or can make a new entry (in which case you would be SB). The new system shows a name for each entry.

Social Security Resources

The links that follow point to resources we use frequently in our Social Security practice. The Connect board (formerly maintained by Peter S. Young and now at David Traver's website) is also a very helpful source of timely advice and information. This is by no means an exhaustive list; we'll add other resources to this page from time-to-time, weather permitting.

Last updated:  April 1, 2005

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Social Security Law
The Social Security Act
Social Security Rulings
20 CFR 404 (Title II)
20 CFR 416 (Title XVI)
20 CFR by Year
The Listings
The Rulings (by year)
POMS on CDROM from SSA
POMS Online
HALLEX
DOT (1991)
DOT (1991) from DOL
The Federal Register (2004)
Federal Rules of Civil Procedure
Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure (with 4th Cir. Local Rules as of 10/5/04)
Fourth Circuit Cases
Fourth Circuit Homepage
Fourth Circuit Acquiesence Rulings
DAA Q&A Emergency Teletype
EM-99147 (Subsequent Apps)

SSA Links
2003 Red Book on Employment Support
2005 Blue Book (Disability Evaluation)
2005 COLA Info
Benefits Calculators
Benefits Eligibility Screening Tool (BEST)
Benefits Statement (How to Request from SSA)
HALLEX on Attorney Fees
Retirement Age Calculator
Social Security Forms
SSI Benefit Levels since 1975
SSI Installment Payments (POMS)
SGA Earnings Guidelines
Work Incentives Program Info

Organizations
Bazelon Center for Mental Health
Bios of Federal Judges
National Council of Social Security Management Associations, Inc.
National Institutes of Health
NOSSCR
National Senior Citizens Law Center
N.C. Justice Center (Hyatt cases)
Social Security Administration
Social Security Advisory Board
U.S. Courts

Secondary Sources
Advocate's Handbook (Wilborn)
Federal Government Info on the Internet
FY 2001 Allowance/Denial Rates
The Green Book (2004)
LII's Social Security Library
NOSSCR Forum Index
Occupational Outlook Handbook
Quarters of Coverage Chart
Social Security Advisory Service
Social Security Disability Directory (McChesney)
SS Disability Practice (Bush)
Social Security Handbook
Social Security History
VA Directive:  Provision of Medical Opinions by VA Docs
West's SS Library (CD)

Other References
Elements of Style (Strunk & White) Online
Lab Tests Online
Lawyer's Weekly
LLRX (legal research/technology)
The Merck Manual
PACER User Manual (PDF)
Proper Citation Form
SS Benefit Calculator
US Census Bureau's FactFinder
Vital Records Information