The Social Security Office of Inspector General (IG) has released a report with a startling conclusion: Administrative Law Judges (ALJ’s) have approved nearly 25,000 applicants for disability “by mistake.”
That is a very interesting assertion.
We hire ALJ’s to judge claims. Is it appropriate for the IG to come along and second-guess these ALJ’s? Doesn’t such an approach call into question the independence of the ALJ’s? I submit that this is not a good thing. What the IG did here is tantamount to intimidation. The IG is sending a chilling message to the ALJ’s: We Are Watching You.
It is hard to believe that the true purpose of a report like this is to pressure ALJ’s into denying more claims. Proof of this may be found in just whom it was that the IG investigated. They went after ALJ’s that the IG felt was approving too many applicants.
Where is the IG’s investigation into ALJ’s who approve too few applicants? You might die of old age waiting for that. This is no mere intellectual exercise. Among the ALJ’s that the IG investigated, SSA disciplined fourteen and fired one.
I don’t know how the IG could have sent a clearer message to our supposedly-independent judges: Turn down more people or get risk your career.
Is this really how the judiciary should work?
