According to employment data released yesterday by The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the Social Security Administration (SSA) increased its personnel by 3 percent in the quarter ending June 30, 2014. The Agency's staffing levels rose from 60,820 to 62,651, a gain of 1,831 employees, and their largest increase in nearly four years. As we previously reported, additional Congressional funding provided the Agency with hiring authority for the first time in recent years. The Agency's workforce remains down considerably from Dec. 2010, when it had 70,270 employees.
The number of Administrative Law Judges (ALJs), however, declined almost 2 percent during this period, from 1,448 to 1,420. This comes as hearing processing times and pending backlogs at the hearing level are increasing. The most recent quarterly data shows hearing processing times up over two months (61 days) since the end of fiscal year 2012. The pending backlog of hearings awaiting a decision is approaching one million claims (955,001), as of June 30.
