BY JAMES PATTERSON
OPINION —
With a national election within months, Social Security is in the news. Senator Tommy Tuberville, R-Alabama, recently said that many Americans might not see a penny of their Social Security.
During a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee hearing in February, Tuberville said, “There’s going to be about 150 million people coming up here [to Washington] saying, ‘Where’s our damn money that we paid in? I could have put my Social Security money, 40 years in tax, in the [stock] market and probably be worth $8-to-$10 million today but the federal government wasted it.’”
Stock market investments are risky. Stocks fluctuate in value. While Tuberville’s “$8-to-$10 million” investment return from stocks could be high or low, he is right on target about the federal government wasting money.
A top-ranking Biden administration official agrees with Republican Senator Tuberville about the federal government wasting billions of dollars. The Social Security Administration’s Commissioner Martin O’Malley recently told a Senate panel that SSA bureaucrats have lost $23 billion by overpaying beneficiaries.
O’Malley told senators that the massive overpayments were “the agency’s fault.” O’Malley, a former Governor of Maryland, should have said the overpayments were the fault of bureaucrats at his agency. Overpaid, uncaring, irresponsible bureaucrats mistakenly overpaid Social Security recipients.
For years the SSA policy for recovering overpayments was to stop payments until the overpayment was paid back to the agency. This was called “claw-back.” In many cases, this policy left seniors and the disabled with no income. It may have also left them with no health insurance. This policy could have contributed to homelessness and untreated illnesses.
O’Malley said the agency claw-back policy was “cruel.” In the future, he said, Social Security recipients with overpayments will be paid their full monthly benefit check, less 10% to be applied to their overpayment. Effectively, O’Malley is writing off the $23 billion. It will never be repaid. It could easily be repaid.
Seniors and the disabled with Social Security overpayments need compassion. Their Social Security benefits were stopped, according to O’Malley, “when it was the agency’s fault.” Taxpayers, too, need compassion in the form of lower taxes.
Washington politicians regularly argue about Social Security benefits. In an election year, arguments can get heated. Some politicians are accused of seeking higher taxes to fund an inefficient SSA. Other politicians are accused of heartlessly wanting to reduce benefits to seniors. There are other options, like reducing benefits to incompetent federal bureaucrats. The waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement of the SSA is nearly as stunning as its huge overpayment scandal.
Higher taxes on workers are always the first solution offered when it comes to the solvency of the Social Security Trust Fund. Higher taxes will never be sufficient to pay for massive bureaucratic errors, like overpayments to recipients of $23 billion. Taxpayers should not have to pay for incompetent bureaucrats.
Since bureaucrats can’t be fired, they have no incentive to prevent future overpayments. Taxpayers need a better managed and professional federal workforce. Until federal utopia arises from its current state of utter mediocrity, Congress should consider other options.
Before allowing O’Malley to write off $23 billion as a loss, Congress should determine how much, if any, of the $23 billion is fraud. People who defrauded the SSA should be held accountable. If they aren’t, then more fraud will occur.
Second, since O’Malley admitted that his employees were at fault for making $23 billion in overpayments, Congress should hold his agency accountable. A part of SSA’s budget should be applied to the overpayment.
Third, Congress should determine if any part of the overpayment was caused by federal unions. If union members and their lawyers misrepresented facts to Social Security administrators, they should be held accountable for overpayments.
Fourth, Congress should determine if other federal agencies were responsible for Social Security overpayments. If HR personnel at federal agencies gave federal workers incorrect or false information in calculating Social Security benefits, then federal agency budgets should be charged to recover for overpayments. This may be a surprise, but incompetent bureaucrats work at multiple federal agencies.
Federal salaries increase annually. Social Security overpayments remain high. For the last fiscal year, SSA reported an overpayment of $11.1 billion. Commissioner O’Malley has a huge job managing his out-of-control workforce. Americans deserve better.
If Congress should force a hiring freeze to bring the SSA under control, they likely fear the agency would further spin out of control. When their constituents complain of SSA’s poor customer service, Congress would authorize more funding for the agency. Such political circularity is a virtual certainty in Washington.
Unless the SSA is better managed, Senator Tuberville’s prediction could come true: Americans might never see a penny of their Social Security.
James Patterson is a life member of the Auburn Univ. Alumni AssocIation.
