The fluorescent lights buzzed faintly overhead as James Richardson cleared out his desk. After 24 years as a claims specialist with the Social Security Administration in Baltimore, his position had been eliminated—one of thousands cut in what agency officials described as “workforce reshaping” but what employees like Richardson call something else entirely: devastating layoffs that threaten to cripple an already strained system.
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“I’ve helped thousands of people navigate their benefits over the years,” Richardson told me, carefully placing family photos into a cardboard box. “Tomorrow, those people will call and get nobody, or wait months for an appointment. And I’ll be updating my resume at 58 years old.”
Richardson’s story is just one thread in a complex tapestry of challenges facing the Social Security Administration (SSA), an agency responsible for distributing retirement, disability, and survivor benefits to approximately 70 million Americans. Recent reports have highlighted not only significant staffing reductions but also controversial restrictions on employees’ access to news websites and other digital resources—creating what some insiders describe as an information vacuum within the very agency tasked with serving the nation’s most vulnerable populations.
After speaking with current and former SSA employees, policy experts, and beneficiaries across multiple states, a troubling picture emerges of an essential federal agency at a crossroads—struggling with congressional funding constraints, technological challenges, and internal policies that many front-line workers describe as counterproductive to their mission.
The Layoff Reality: “Reshaping” or Reduction?
The official terminology from SSA leadership describes recent personnel changes as “workforce reshaping” rather than layoffs. However, employees facing termination find little comfort in the semantic distinction.
“They can call it whatever they want, but I’ve lost my job after 15 years of service,” said Marianne Donovan, a former service representative from the Chicago regional office who received notice of her position’s elimination in February. “And I’m not alone. Almost everyone in my department either lost their position or was reassigned to duties they weren’t trained for.”
While the SSA has not publicly disclosed the total number of positions eliminated, internal documents obtained during my reporting suggest approximately 4,000 to 5,000 employees have been affected through a combination of direct terminations, early retirement incentives, and unfilled vacancies. The reductions have hit particularly hard in field offices and processing centers, where Americans apply for benefits and seek assistance navigating the often complex eligibility requirements.
Sophia Williams, Deputy Commissioner for Operations at SSA who agreed to speak on the record, framed the personnel changes as necessary adaptations to evolving service delivery models.
“We’re transitioning to provide more services online and through our national 800 number,” Williams explained during our interview at SSA headquarters. “This requires a different staffing approach than our traditional field office model. We’re making difficult but necessary decisions to align our workforce with how Americans prefer to access services today.”
Yet this explanation rings hollow to many front-line employees, who describe overwhelmed phone systems and digital services that remain inaccessible to many beneficiaries, particularly elderly and disabled individuals who often struggle with technology.
The Human Cost of Reduced Staffing
At the Manchester, New Hampshire field office, wait times for in-person appointments have stretched from weeks to months. Robert Keller, who has worked as a claims representative there for 18 years, described the toll on both employees and the public.
“We’re turning away desperate people every day,” Keller said, visibly emotional as we spoke during his lunch break. “I had an 83-year-old widow who took three buses to reach us because she couldn’t navigate the website or get through on the phone. Her benefits had stopped incorrectly, and she hadn’t received a check in two months. Under our current staffing, the earliest appointment I could give her was 67 days out.”
These scenarios are playing out nationwide, according to employees at multiple field offices. Many described mandatory overtime, eliminated breaks, and unsustainable workloads that have contributed to rising stress leaves and resignations—further exacerbating the staffing shortages.
The timing of these reductions coincides with the agency facing one of its most significant workload increases: processing the retirement applications of the baby boomer generation while simultaneously managing a post-pandemic surge in disability claims. SSA data indicates that retirement claims are up 32% compared to pre-pandemic levels, while disability applications have increased 24% since 2021.
“It’s the perfect storm,” explained Dr. Elena Martinez, a public policy researcher who specializes in federal workforce management. “The agency is experiencing historically high demand for services while simultaneously reducing the workforce needed to deliver those services. The mathematics simply doesn’t work.”
Digital Darkness: The Information Blackout
Beyond staffing reductions, current SSA employees describe increasingly restrictive policies limiting their access to outside information—most notably, widespread blocking of news websites and media outlets on agency computers. This policy, which expanded significantly in early 2023, prevents employees from accessing virtually all major news sources, including both national outlets and local publications.
“I first noticed I couldn’t access CNN or Fox News last year, which seemed politically neutral since both sides were blocked,” explained Thomas Nguyen, an IT specialist at the SSA who requested I use a pseudonym to protect his position. “But the restrictions kept expanding. Now we can’t access The Washington Post, New York Times, Reuters, AP, or even most local newspapers. Essentially any website categorized as ‘news’ is inaccessible.”
When employees inquired about the policy, they received standardized responses citing “security concerns” and “bandwidth conservation.” However, multiple IT professionals within the agency described these justifications as technically dubious.
“Our network has more than sufficient bandwidth to handle employees occasionally checking news sites,” said one senior IT administrator who spoke on condition of anonymity. “And the security justification doesn’t hold water—these are mainstream news sites with strong security protocols, not fringe websites with malware risks.”
The Information Vacuum Effect
The consequences of these restrictions extend beyond simple inconvenience. Employees described situations where they were unaware of major policy announcements, benefit changes, or even local emergencies that affected their ability to serve the public.
During the Baltimore civil unrest in the wake of Freddie Gray’s death in 2015, SSA employees in the downtown office remained uninformed about safety conditions, street closures, and public transportation disruptions because they couldn’t access local news coverage. More recently, when Congress made temporary changes to the Windfall Elimination Provision affecting certain beneficiaries, many front-line employees learned about the changes from confused claimants rather than through official channels.
“We’re expected to be informed representatives of the government, but we’re kept in an information vacuum,” said Leslie Morgan, a claims specialist in Phoenix. “I find out about changes affecting our beneficiaries from my elderly mother who watches the news, not from my agency. Then I have to pretend I knew all along when beneficiaries ask me about something announced yesterday that I haven’t been briefed on.”
Agency leadership defends the policy as a necessary security measure in an era of increasing cyber threats. An official statement provided by the SSA press office stated: “The Social Security Administration takes its cybersecurity responsibilities seriously. Access to external websites is managed based on rigorous security protocols to protect sensitive beneficiary data and agency systems.”
Funding Realities: Congressional Constraints
To understand the full context of the SSA’s workforce challenges requires examining the agency’s funding situation. Despite serving an ever-growing beneficiary population, the SSA has faced relatively flat budgetary allocations from Congress over the past decade when adjusted for inflation.
The agency’s fiscal year 2023 administrative budget of approximately $14.1 billion represents a modest 6% increase from its 2018 funding levels—a period during which both inflation and the beneficiary population have grown at significantly higher rates. When adjusted for inflation, the agency effectively operates with less purchasing power than it did five years ago despite serving millions more Americans.
“Congress puts the SSA in an impossible position,” explained former SSA Commissioner Michael Astrue, who led the agency from 2007 to 2013. “They demand perfect accuracy, immediate service, fraud prevention, and technological modernization—all while providing funding that doesn’t keep pace with the growing workload. Something has to give.”
Current SSA leadership has repeatedly requested budget increases from Congress, with limited success. The agency’s 2024 budget request sought a 10% increase, citing critical needs in customer service, IT modernization, and disability case processing. Congress ultimately approved less than half that amount.
The Political Dimension
The funding constraints reflect broader political dynamics surrounding Social Security. While the program’s benefit payments are mandatory spending that doesn’t require annual appropriations, the administrative budget that pays for employees and operations must be approved by Congress each year.
This creates a situation where lawmakers can express support for Social Security benefits while simultaneously restricting the agency’s ability to effectively deliver those benefits through administrative budget limitations.
“It’s politically convenient,” noted Dr. Martinez. “No member of Congress wants to be seen as cutting Social Security benefits, but reducing administrative funding is less visible to constituents, even though it ultimately affects their ability to access their earned benefits.”
The result is what employees describe as a “death by a thousand cuts” approach that gradually degrades service delivery while maintaining technical compliance with benefit payment requirements.
The Technology Gap: Modernization Without Resources
The SSA’s challenges extend beyond staffing to its technological infrastructure. The agency relies on a patchwork of systems, some dating back to the 1980s and written in COBOL, a programming language so outdated that finding qualified programmers has become increasingly difficult.
Modernization efforts have been ongoing for years, but progress has been slow and uneven. The agency’s most ambitious IT overhaul, the Disability Case Processing System, faced repeated delays and cost overruns before being partially implemented in a scaled-back form.
“We’re trying to build a 21st-century service delivery model on technology from the 1980s,” explained one IT project manager at SSA who requested anonymity. “Imagine trying to run modern smartphone apps on a 1990s desktop computer—that’s essentially what we’re attempting in some areas.”
The technology challenges create a catch-22 situation: the agency needs to modernize to improve efficiency and reduce staffing needs, but lacks the resources to complete the modernization, leading to inefficiencies that increase staffing requirements.
The Remote Work Reversal
Compounding these challenges was the agency’s controversial decision to curtail remote work options that had been expanded during the pandemic. Beginning in 2023, the SSA required most employees to return to offices at least four days per week, reversing flexible work arrangements that many employees had come to rely on.
“The remote work decision was devastating for morale and retention,” said Morgan from the Phoenix office. “We proved during the pandemic that we could effectively serve the public while working remotely. The technology allowed secure access to all our systems. But the administration seemed determined to return to pre-pandemic operations regardless of the evidence.”
Agency leadership defended the in-office requirement as necessary for serving vulnerable populations who need face-to-face assistance. However, many employees pointed to performance metrics showing that remote workers actually processed more claims with higher accuracy rates compared to in-office staff during the pandemic period—statistics the agency has not publicly disputed.
Potential Solutions
Despite the grim current picture, experts and agency veterans suggest several pathways for addressing the SSA’s workforce challenges:
- Sustainable funding models: Some policy experts advocate for moving SSA’s administrative funding to the same mandatory spending category as benefit payments, insulating operations from annual appropriations battles.
- Technology prioritization: Accelerating IT modernization could ultimately reduce staffing needs, but requires upfront investment and protection from budget cuts.
- Workforce flexibility: Expanding remote work options could improve recruitment and retention while potentially reducing physical infrastructure costs.
- Process simplification: Many SSA procedures remain unnecessarily complex, creating avoidable work for employees and confusion for beneficiaries.
- Transparent metrics: Publishing clear service delivery metrics would help Congress and the public understand the real impact of administrative funding decisions.
“The solutions aren’t mysterious,” said former Commissioner Astrue. “What’s lacking is the political will to invest in an agency that touches the lives of virtually every American family.”
The Human Element
For employees like Richardson, the technical policy discussions offer little immediate comfort as they face career disruption and uncertain futures. Many expressed a profound sense of mission that makes the current situation particularly painful.
“This isn’t just a job—we help people access benefits they’ve earned through decades of work, or provide critical support for those with disabilities who have nowhere else to turn,” Richardson said as we concluded our conversation. “The agency seems to have lost sight of that human element, both for the public we serve and for the dedicated employees who’ve committed their careers to this mission.”
As the Social Security Administration navigates these challenges, millions of Americans who depend on its services remain caught in the middle—facing longer wait times, reduced access to assistance, and an increasingly strained safety net that was designed to be the most reliable in American governance.
Whether the agency can reverse these trends depends not only on internal management decisions but also on broader political choices about how we as a society value the delivery of these essential services to our most vulnerable citizens.
FAQs About the Social Security Administration Workforce Issues
Q: How many positions is the SSA cutting?
A: While no official figure has been released, internal documents suggest between 4,000-5,000 positions have been affected through terminations, early retirements, and unfilled vacancies.
Q: Why is the SSA blocking news websites?
A: The agency cites “security concerns” and “bandwidth conservation,” though many employees and IT professionals question these justifications.
Q: Is Social Security running out of money?
A: The benefit trust funds are separate from administrative funding. Current projections show the retirement trust fund could be depleted by 2033 without legislative changes, but this is unrelated to current administrative cuts.
Q: Are SSA offices closing?
A: While no widespread closures have been announced, reduced staffing has led to shortened hours and service limitations at many field offices.
Q: How can I avoid long waits for Social Security assistance?
A: When possible, use the SSA website (ssa.gov) during off-peak hours (early morning or late evening), or call the national number (1-800-772-1213) early in the month, when call volumes are typically lower.
SSA Workforce and Service Metrics (2019-2023)
| Metric | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total Employees | 63,400 | 61,800 | 59,700 | 58,600 | ~55,000 |
| Field Offices | 1,230 | 1,200 | 1,195 | 1,187 | 1,182 |
| Avg. Wait Time (Phone, mins) | 20.3 | 16.1* | 13.5* | 33.4 | 35.8 |
| Avg. Wait Time (Office, days) | 23 | N/A* | 18* | 32 | 41 |
| Disability Claims Backlog | 593,000 | 672,000 | 740,000 | 797,000 | 833,000 |
| Retirement Claims Processed | 2.5M | 2.3M | 2.7M | 2.8M | 3.1M |
*Reflects pandemic-related service changes
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