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Massachusetts SSA Furloughs Impact Disability Applicants

Furloughs have impacted the wait times for Social Security disability benefit applicants around the country and Massachusetts can now be added to the list of states that will place Social Security Administration (SSA) employees on furlough.

According to The Boston Herald, more than 80% of the state's disability workers in charge of approving applications have been furloughed as a result of a recent decision by Gov. Deval Patrick. That means that despite the increase in disability applications, 228 out of 272 workers are now forced to take some days off of work without receiving pay.

Officials in charge of the SSA, as well as those who will be affected by the longer wait times this decision will bring, are baffled by the furloughs. Because the SSA is federally funded, the state will save no money through this move. The Governor's reasoning is that state workers have also been requested to take furloughs in an effort to save the state money, and those in charge simply wanted to be fair to all employees.

The typical wait time in Massachusetts for a decision on an SSA disability application was 82 days in 2008 and 87 days in 2009. The wait for 2010 is projected to be 96 days, demonstrating that now is not a good time to cut the hours for SSA employees. Those impacted by the decision have expressed hope that the furloughs will eventually be repealed.

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