Lax Social Security judges improperly awarded nearly 25,000 people $2 billion over a seven-year period, the Social Security inspector general reported Friday.
In a report that was requested by the Republican-led House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in January, Inspector General Patrick O’Carroll Jr., found 44 Social Security administrative law judges who approved the vast majority of their claimants, over 85 percent of cases.
Taking a sample of the cases approved by those judges and referring questionable awards to Social Security’s own quality monitor, the inspector general extrapolated that those judges accounted for nearly 25,000 beneficiaries whose awards may have been granted improperly.
Over the past seven years, the inspector general estimated, Social Security has spent $2 billion on those disability recipients and will “continue paying approximately $273 million to these same beneficiaries over the next 12 months.”
Darrell Issa, the Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee, criticized the Social Security Administration in a statement accompanying the release, saying that its “failure to conduct timely medical eligibility reviews has resulted in rubber-stamped decisions that have and will continue to cost taxpayers billions in improper awards. In failing to take meaningful disciplinary action at the Social Security Administration, even after the most egregious cases of mismanagement, taxpayers are left to wonder — who is looking after their tax dollars.”
The report indicated the need for reform of the disability program, said Sen. Orrin Hatch, the ranking Republican on the Finance Committee that has oversight over Social Security.
Noting that Social Security’s trustees have warned that the disability program’s trust fund is projected to run out by 2016, Hatch said that it “is imperative that Social Security’s awards processes and program integrity are improved, including examining disability determinations of administrative law judges.”
Hatch also said that “every dollar misspent or wrongly awarded depletes resources for those who are truly in need.”
While the depletion date for the trust fund has drawn nearer, Congress has not progressed on a proposal to address the issue.
The Finance Committee held a hearing on the solvency of the program over the summer, at which top members expressed hope for action. But the politics of the disability program are tied up in partisan disagreements over Social Security’s retirement program and broader fiscal issues.
The inspector general report released Friday concerned beneficiaries not just for Social Security Disability Insurance, but also for Supplemental Security Income program, the disability program for non-workers also administered by Social Security.
There are just over 10 million total beneficiaries of SSDI, according to the Social Security Administration’s latest figures, and 8.4 million beneficiaries of SSI, some of whom also receive SSDI benefits.
The report noted that 15 of the 44 judges examined had been disciplined by the administration, and that oversight of administrative law judges has improved in recent years.
