President Joe Biden’s Fiscal Year 2022 budget proposal calls for more than $14 billion in Social Security funding, which would be close to a 10 percent increase in funding for the agency. According to a message from Social Security Commissioner Andrew Saul, a large portion of the increased funding will be spent on addressing the… Read more »
Categorized: Legal News
Saul Reports Funding Challenges To Congress
Social Security Commissioner Andrew Saul recently wrote a letter to members of congress to outline the struggles the agency is facing due to a lack of funding for the agency. In the letter, as posted on the Social Security website, Saul admitted to a hiring freeze and requested Congress support President Joe Biden’s proposal to… Read more »
Poll Shows People Support Reforming SSI
A recent survey conducted by Data For Progress found that Americans support reforming the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program and that people want community services for seniors and people with disabilities expanded. Part of the reform voters support most is to increase SSI benefits, which is a needs-based benefit for seniors and disabled individuals. Currently… Read more »
Social Security Employees Sound Off On Staffing Issues
We have made the point for years that Social Security is understaffed and has been so for over a decade. Social Security employees themselves confirmed this when they provided survey responses to The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) on ways to improve employee morale, recruitment and retention at Social Security. By far, the most… Read more »
Social Security Not Showing Leadership On Stimulus Payment Issue
In a previous blog post we discussed that millions of Social Security beneficiaries had not yet received the latest round of stimulus payments and that members of Congress were pressuring Social Security to provide answers of why these people had not already received their payments. To be fair, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is in… Read more »
Congress Wants Answers To Why Stimulus Checks Are Being Delayed For Social Security Recipients
Millions of Americans have already received the latest rounds of stimulus checks, but it appears that for a portion of the population there has been a delay in issuing checks and members of Congress want to know why. Several members of Congress teamed up and sent a letter to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to… Read more »
Social Security Will No Longer Suspend Dismissing Hearing Requests
Social Security is not quite going back to its old practices entirely, but its recent decision to scrap the decision to suspend issuing dismissals for untimely requests for disability hearings and for claimants that do not appear for their hearing, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, is a move toward the agency’s regular operating procedures. This… Read more »
Social Security COVID-19 Updates
Since the COVID-19 pandemic caused shutdowns across the country in March of 2020 Social Security has updated its procedures in processing Social Security disability claims. The days of strolling into a Social Security field office are no longer possible because most Social Security offices are allowing only limited in-office appointments for service. Because obtaining services… Read more »
What Social Security Might Look Like When the Pandemic Subsides
We are approaching the one-year mark since Social Security closed its field offices and hearing offices to the public in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. We now have three effective vaccines to combat the virus and the number of new cases and hospitalizations due to COVID-19 are dropping, but things are not likely to go… Read more »
It May Be Time For Social Security To Add A COVID-19 Listing
Social Security’s listings of impairments are a guide to medically qualifying for Social Security disability benefits. The listings have all different sorts of diagnosed conditions and impairments and what limitations must be present to be eligible for benefits. Since COVID-19 began showing up in the United States at the beginning of 2020 it changed our… Read more »
