An Interesting 4th Circuit Opinion

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals handed down an interesting opinion last week in the case of Mascio v. Colvin. Here are a few excerpts:


Here,
the ALJ has
determined
what functions he believes
Mascio can perform, but
his
opinion is sorely lacking in
the
analysis
needed
for us to review
meaningfully
those conclusions.
In particular, although the ALJ concluded that Mascio can
perform

21 Month Sentence For Former Social Security Employee

From the Dallas Morning News:


A former Social Security Administration employee was sentenced Friday to 21 months in federal prison for accessing the agency’s electronic databases to steal government money, the U.S. attorney’s office said.



Carwin Shaw, 33, of Arlington, was also ordered to pay $78,165 in restitution for his role in the scheme. ...



He also caused unauthorized

White House Criticizes GOP Effort To Force Social Security Showdown

From TPM:


A top adviser to President Barack Obama on
Friday slammed a House Republican maneuver aimed at forcing a showdown
on Social Security as early as next year, signaling that it won't fly
with the White House.




"The House provision was un-constructive and at odds with how this
issue has been addressed time and time again in a bipartisan manner,"
Brian Deese, senior advisor

ALJ Sues Over Alleged Discrimination

From the Portland (Maine) Press Herald:


A judge who rules on disability cases for the Social Security
Administration has sued the federal agency, accusing her supervisors of
age and gender discrimination and retaliating against her for filing
complaints about her treatment.

Administrative Law Judge Katherine Morgan, one of seven judges in the
Office of Disability Adjudication and

New Regulations On Submission Of Evidence

Social Security is publishing new regulations in the Federal Register on the submission of evidence tomorrow. You can read them today.

Some Questions: What's the enforcement mechanism for these requirements? If there's no enforcement mechanism, is this anything more than precatory language? As vague as these regulations are, even if there is an enforcement mechanism, is it practical

Empty Threats

In the narrative explanation of its budget proposal, the House Budget Committee says that "There should be no
raiding of the Social Security retirement
program to bailout another, currently unsustainable
program." The "unsustainable program" it's talking about is Social Security disability which has its own Disability Trust Fund separate from the Retirement and Survivors Trust Fund. Since

Doesn't Seem Fair

From BuzzFeed:


Two legal nonprofit groups filed a class action lawsuit against the
Social Security Administration Tuesday for its treatment of married
same-sex couples after the Supreme Court struck down a federal law that
prevented the federal government from recognizing their marriages.

For almost a year after the Supreme Court struck down the Defense of
Marriage Act as

New Ruling On Interstitial Cystitis

A new Social Security Ruling on the evaluation of interstitial cystitis in disability claims will appear in the Federal Register tomorrow but you can read it today. The Ruling replaces SSR 02-2p.

Social Security Offices To Be Open Four More Hours Per Week

From a Social Security press release:


Social Security announces as a result of Congress’ approval of the
fiscal year 2015 budget, the agency will expand its hours nationwide
and offices will be open to the public for an additional hour on
Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, effective March 16, 2015. A
field office that is usually open from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. will

Hiltzik On 60 Minutes Piece

Michael Hiltzik didn't think much of the 60 Minutes piece on the problems with Social Security's Death Master File (DMF). Here are a few excerpts from his column:



[60 Minutes] implied that it had turned up this scandal through its own
digging, so it didn't mention that errors in the DMF is a hardy
journalistic perennial, like reports on how bad the traffic is in your
town or

Hope This Works

Maybe my complaint about Social Security's ineffective process for notifying the public of office closings did some good. Here's an e-mail I received from the agency:
.ivanC14259149452600{position:absolute;visibility:hidden;}

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This Should Be Fun

From The Hill:


Republicans in the House and Senate plan to release separate budget
blueprints this month, creating the potential for conflict as they head
into a new fiscal battle with President Obama. ...

Details about what will be in the budget plans are scarce, but
Republicans have stressed the need to cut the deficit and bring the
budget “within balance,” which will require

The Octopus

From an op ed by Daniel Hatcher in the Baltimore Sun:


Our state foster care agencies [in Maryland] are apparently so underfunded that they are taking resources from abused and neglected children. The agencies are taking control over foster children's Social Security benefits (when the children are disabled or have deceased parents) and using the children's funds to repay foster care costs

Improved Video Hearing Picture Quality

I don't know how widespread this is but in Eastern North Carolina, Social Security's Office of Disability Adjudication and Review (ODAR) has installed new equipment for video hearings which significantly improves picture quality. The new equipment doesn't take us to true hi-def. I'd say it improves picture quality from circa 1954 (or perhaps 1944) to circa 1990, which is a major

This Is Lame

The Social Security Administration has a website that promises information about office closings updated "every 10 minutes." This is what it says right now:


Due to severe weather conditions impacting the Mid-Atlantic and other
parts of the country, offices in New Jersey, Maryland, Washington D.C.,
Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Alabama, Tennessee,
Kentucky,

I Think This Is New

An example added recently to Social Security's Program Operations Manual Series (POMS):


A 50-year-old claimant with a high school education and unskilled past
relevant work has an RFC [Residual Functional Capacity] for standing/walking 2 hours of an 8-hour day
and sitting approximately 6 hours of an 8-hour day. He is able to
lift/carry/push/pull 20 pounds occasionally and 10 pounds

Workers Comp Cuts Costing Social Security

From Linda DePillis writing for the Washington Post's Wonkblog:


There’s a good news/bad news situation for occupational injuries in the
United States: Fewer people are getting hurt on the job. But those who
do are getting less help. ...

“The cutbacks [in workers compensation] have been so drastic in some places that they virtually
guarantee injured workers will plummet into poverty,”

Average Retirement Age Has Gone Up

From a report by Alicia Munnell of the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College

This Is How Some Overpayments Happen

Social Security has created a "Work Site", a website that's supposed to encourage return to work but it includes no information on how a disability recipient is supposed to notify the agency if he or she has returned to work. You're supposed to call the agency's 800 number but given the wait time on those calls, many claimants get frustrated and give up.

I looked into this because

New Procedure For Some Blindness Cases

Social Security has finally devised a procedure for dealing with claimants who are working and who allege that they have become statutorily blind while already on disability benefits without regard to blindness. Different standards apply to work activity in blindness cases. I had a case like this some years ago. Everyone conceded that a different standard applied to those who are