The Social Security Administration (SSA) announced Thursday that it "will soon implement agency-wide organizational restructuring that will include significant workforce reductions."
The planned cuts, which are in line with an executive order from President Trump to broadly slash the federal workforce, are raising concerns about staffing at the agency that disburses retirement savings, as well as disability and survivor benefits, to tens of millions of Americans.
Advocates say long wait times for services have plagued the agency for years, and its staffing of some 60,000 employees is already at about a 50-year low. Ahead of the looming broader cuts, at least five of eight regional commissioners have recently resigned, according to a senior SSA official who was not authorized to speak to the press.
Morale at the agency is extremely low, the source said, as staff are crying in meetings and managers are trying to reassure their employees during a time of great uncertainty.
"The public is going to suffer terribly as a result of this," the source wrote to NPR. "Local field offices will close, hold times will increase, and people will be sicker, hungry, or die when checks don't arrive or a disability hearing is delayed just one month too late."
Trump has said that Social Security "won't be touched" as he continues to make sweeping cuts to the federal government.
Until now, the SSA has been largely spared from efforts, mainly overseen by billionaire Elon Musk, to slash the size of the federal government. That includes a federal hiring freeze and more recent dismissals of large numbers of mostly newer workers. But in the last week or so, the agency has faced much of the same chaos and disruption that has been experienced by other federal departments. Changes at the agency are also leading to worries among employees and cybersecurity experts about the protection of sensitive records.
The agency's prior acting commissioner, Michelle King, was recently replaced after clashing with associates of Musk's Department of Government Efficiency who sought access to sensitive personal data held by the agency. King has been replaced by Leland Dudek, who was being investigated internally before being promoted, according to the SSA official.
The protection of sensitive data is one of the top concerns for SSA employees: "SSA is incredibly risk averse. And for good reason," the SSA official said. "The data we house is intimate and comprehensive. Every U.S. man, woman and child (living and dead), has a Social Security Number and records of their work, income, tax, disability and civil relationships. And now DOGE has access to all of it."
The SSA's servers are vast, complex and archaic, processing billions of data points a day, often using programming languages that few people are familiar with, the source continued. Those systems are already under constant attack by digital adversaries from around the world, creating a constant challenge for those tasked with protecting the systems.
There are no indications that the engineers working with DOGE have gone through required training to protect federal records, the source said, nor specific agency-level training to work in each department's unique systems. Lawmakers have already begun to raise the alarm about cybersecurity concerns of DOGE's access to federal systems, while legal cases about DOGE's access are ongoing.
Max Richtman, president & CEO of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, told NPR that the process to get disability benefits, in particular, is "so cumbersome and difficult to navigate" and insufficiently staffed that in the last couple of years, "about 10,000 claimants who appealed for their benefits die waiting for their claim to be resolved."

Oh my, all this time I thought/assumed that, originally, it was set up this way so as to avoid taxing state governments. 76 and not to old to learn. ;)

What's the difference between constructing your own "Fund of Funds" and being told by some MFOers that having too many funds is inefficient, wasteful, and self-defeating, as we've all heard here so many times over the years?

What's the difference between constructing your own "Fund of Funds" and being told by some MFOers that having too many funds is inefficient, wasteful, and self-defeating, as we've all heard here so many times over the years?

DODIX DODGX 50/50 And forget about it.

Why not just 100% DODBX?

Many Americans are pinching pennies, exhausted by high prices and stubborn inflation. The well-off are spending with abandon. The top 10% of earners—households making about $250,000 a year or more—are splurging on everything from vacations to designer handbags, buoyed by big gains in stocks, real estate and other assets.
Those consumers now account for 49.7% of all spending, a record in data going back to 1989, according to an analysis by Moody’s Analytics. Three decades ago, they accounted for about 36%. All this means that economic growth is unusually reliant on rich Americans continuing to shell out. Moody’s Analytics has estimated that spending by the top 10% alone accounted for almost one-third of gross domestic product.
Between September 2023 and September 2024, the high earners increased their spending by 12%. Spending by working-class and middle-class households, meanwhile, dropped over the same period.
Taken together, well-off people have increased their spending far beyond inflation, while everyone else hasn’t. The bottom 80% of earners spent 25% more than they did four years earlier, barely outpacing price increases of 21% over that period. The top 10% spent 58% more.
The buying power of the richest Americans, who tend to be older and more educated, stems in part from the swelling values of homes and the stock market over the past several years. Rising asset prices are widening the gap between those who own property and stocks, and those who don’t.
During the pandemic, Americans across the spectrum saved at record levels. Then inflation struck, and prices rose sharply. Most Americans turned to their extra savings to keep up with their rising bills. But the top 10% of earners kept most of what they had saved up.

President Trump cautioned lawmakers earlier this month about making cuts to Medicaid. But just after Trump left the room, one budget hawk remarked: “We could get $2.5 trillion if we cut Medicaid.”
House Republicans are deeply divided on Medicaid, split between spending hard-liners who want big savings and pragmatists who warn against angering voters. Steve Bannon recently warned about the dangers of cutting Medicaid. “A lot of MAGAs on Medicaid,” he said. “Just can’t take a meat ax to it, although I would love to.”
House Freedom Caucus members and other budget hawks successfully pressed for an amendment that directly ties $2 trillion in spending reductions over 10 years to the party’s tax-cut effort. Under that provision, the more the GOP pulls from Medicaid and other programs, the more financial room Republicans have.
States help fund and manage the program, which provides health insurance for roughly 72 million people, or about one in five Americans, including children and people with low incomes or disabilities. The federal government spends about $600 billion annually on Medicaid.
Republicans aren’t allowed to touch Social Security in the fast-track legislative process they are using, and Trump has said he opposes reducing Medicare benefits, leaving Medicaid as one of the remaining ways to significantly shrink spending. Within a 24-hour period, Trump stated that Medicaid shouldn’t be touched but also posted on X that he backs the House-led package that is likely to rely on cuts to Medicaid to meet its targets.
White House spokesman Kush Desai said that the Trump administration is “committed to protecting Medicaid while slashing the waste, fraud, and abuse within the program—reforms that will increase efficiency and improve care for beneficiaries.”
Some House Republicans say keeping Medicaid intact is essential if they want to hold the House majority in 2026. Some are privately warning party leadership that there are scores of members—including some in safe GOP districts—who oppose deep cuts. Rep. David Valadao (R., Calif.) argues that the Trump coalition now includes many Medicaid recipients.
The program is popular. A recent poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation found nearly 80% of respondents—and 65% of Republicans—think the federal government spends about the right amount or not enough on Medicaid. But budget hawks believe now is their best chance to address deepening federal deficits, which have ballooned the U.S. debt to $34 trillion.