60 Minutes does what? Social Security Disability
From the Los Angelos Times comes this article on Social Security Disability and reporting:
Is it possible for a major news organization to produce a story about the Social Security disability program without interviewing a single disabled person or disability advocate?
That’s the experiment “60 Minutes” conducted Sunday. The result was predictably ghastly.
The news program’s theme was that disability recipients are ripping off the taxpayer. Anchor Steve Kroft called the program “a secret welfare system… ravaged by waste and fraud.” His chief source was Sen. Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican with a documented hostility to Social Security. Coburn has a report on the disability program’s purported flaws due out Monday. Good of “60 Minutes” to give him some free publicity.
Together Kroft and Coburn displayed a rank ignorance about the disability program: how it works, who the beneficiaries are, why it has grown. This is especially shocking because after a similarly overwrought and inaccurate “investigation” of disability aired on National Public Radio in March, numerous experts came forth to set the record straight. They included eight former Social Security commissioners, experienced analysts of the program, even the Social Security Administration’s chief actuary, Steve Goss.
“60 Minutes” apparently talked to none of them.
…
The rolls have grown consistently since 1980, but even though Coburn professes to be dumbfounded why, there’s no mystery. As Goss laid out the factors, they include a 41% increase in the total population aged 20-64. Then there’s the demographic aging of America, which has increased the prevalence of disability by 38%. (In case Coburn, a physician, hasn’t noticed, the older you get, the more vulnerable you are to injury and illness.) Then there’s the entry of women into the workforce in large numbers, which has brought many of them under Social Security coverage for the first time.
Finally, there’s the economy. When jobs are scarce, more people land on the disability rolls, but that’s not about people treating it as an alternative welfare or unemployment program, as “60 Minutes” would have it.
The relationship between disability and unemployment is much more nuanced. As we explained in April, disabled people always have more difficulty finding jobs than others. A disability can upend your life, leaving you confused about where to turn next. If you have a disability that affects your ability to work, you may be entitled to Social Security Disability benefits. Consult with professional social security disability services to learn more on this.
(hat tip DC)
You ask why 60 Minutes would run that story last Sunday. The answer is that on the very next day the Senate released a two year study about fraud at DI.
CBS was trying to stay ahead of the news. Ignore 60 Minutes, but do read that report:
http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/budget/326985-senate-report-finds-disability-benefits-fraud
I haven’t seen that one…will take a look.
B:
How does recipients ripping off SSDI correlate with:
“A two-year investigation of his actions representing claimants applying for Social Security Disability Insurance ‘SSDI’) and Supplemental Security Income (“SSI”) benefits uncovered a raft of improper practices by the Conn law firm to obtain disability benefits, inappropriate collusion between Mr. Conn and a Social Security Administrative Law Judge, and inept agency oversight which enabled the misconduct to continue for years,’ the report concludes.'”
It appears to be more the law firm and the Administrative Judge than the recipients?
You are a moron…stop posting this crap. SSDI has been, continues to be, and will forever be ripped-off for as long as it is in existence.
Just passing through Hammer?
Ahhhh Hammer:
No, the vast percentage of it is not a rip off. Another Pink Cadillac story. Is that you Ronnie posting?
After a quick search it certainly quickly became a non story….Coburn’s claim of a third of claims being fraudulent and then what his investigation in truth reported are so far apart as to be a lie as far as I can tell…BK, ??? what’s up?
WVA and Kentucky were the two states involved….
Important report, dan…! This is why i do’nt watch them anymore…
It would be ridiculous to say that there is absolutely no fraud in SS’s programs. No public or private system is fool- or fraud-proof. But, it is just flat impossible to conclude as Sen. Coburn did, that fraud or some similar fault on the part of one law firm working in concert with one ALJ proves conclusively that the DIB program is riddled with fraud. Nope, no way, no how, no maybe to it. Even if the law firm and ALJ did engage in fraud it would be extremely difficult to prove them guilty of violating the fraud provisions of the SS Act.
Why so hard to prove? Well, the claimant may have had no knowledge of the law firm and ALJ’s actions. If so, you can’t say that the claimant did anything wrong. If s/he did meet the DIB requirements, then it was appropriate to award him/her benefits. Even if the ALJ and lawyer did not follow the regulations for documenting the hearing, that doesn’t mean that there was actual fraud involved. They could engage in more improper practices than you can shake a stick at, but that would not necessarily be fraud.
In my 32 years of SSA experience, I found or had knowledge of approx. 20 cases of clear criminal fraud. Some of these were doozies–feigned blindness, the creation of multiple fictious claimants, or outright theft of recipients’ checks or payments. Others were related to delayed reports of income or other changes in circumstances that affect payment amounts. I talked to or had some part processing the cases of thousands of beneficiaries. Those 20 fraud cases represent a tiny fraction of all the cases handled in my district office in a year. That’s consistent with the experience of other managers and SSA’s Inspector General’s Office–maybe 1/2 of 1% of all cases involve fraud.
Sen. Coburn has undoubtedly convinced himself that fraud is running rampant in every SS district in the company. Well, t’aint so, Senator. You may have been a fine doctor. But, when it comes to Social Security programs you just don’t know what you’re talking about. NancyO