The possibility of further Social Security cutbacks has been a reality for years. But with Republicans taking over Congress, Social Security advocates are worried that deep cuts will come sooner than later.
That doesn’t necessarily mean benefit cuts – it more likely means funding decreases for the Social Security Administration, which leads to reduced staff and increased service issues.
From the Washington Post:
From fiscal year 2011 through 2013, the Social Security Administration received $2.7 billion less than Obama requested, followed by a small increase in 2014, according to a Senate Special Committee on Aging report.
“The three previous years of low funding, combined with a wave of retirements and a hiring freeze that has been in place since 2010, led to a reduction in staffing throughout SSA’s operations,” the report said.
Staffing reductions mean service reductions. The notion of doing more with less only goes so far and that is not far enough to maintain service without cuts.
Citing data from the National Council of Social Security Management Associations, the committee said field-office staffing dropped 14 percent from 2011 to 2014.
“In March 2013, SSA estimated that in a single week nearly 12,000 visitors to field offices would have to wait over two hours to be served, a figure that had almost tripled in the previous four months,” according to the Senate report on reductions in face to face SSA services. “Between FY 2010 and January of FY 2013, the average wait time for field office visitors without appointments increased by 40 percent.”
Public hours at field offices have been reduced by the equivalent of one full day a week since 2011, and wait times for callers to the agency’s 800 number averaged more than 17 minutes in 2014, more than triple the five-minute average wait just two years earlier.
Good luck to Social Security clients requesting a hearing after being denied benefits. They’ll need a great deal of patience. There are about 1 million cases in the hearing backlog. SSA estimates it will take an average, not a maximum, of 435 calendar days for those clients to get a decision.
“Shameful” is the word acting SSA commissioner, Carolyn Colvin, had for the backlog.
Witold Skwierczynski, president of AFGE’s Social Security Council, told the Washington Post that the group was expecting a “coming tide of budget cuts”.
Photo Credit: Tax Credits via Flickr Creative Commons License
