As the U.S. government shutdown stretches into its second month, agency leaders at the Social Security Administration (SSA) are becoming increasingly worried about how the key government department, which provides benefits to roughly 70 million Americans, will continue to operate.
WIRED obtained meeting notes from a Thursday SSA call for the administration’s field offices, where over a thousand managers from around the country spoke with field operations chief Andy Sriubas about the acute and damaging effects of the government shutdown. During the call, managers spoke candidly about staffers who can no longer afford to drive to work and a crisis of confidence in the agency.
“People are coming to me saying they cannot put gas in their car and they cannot afford to come to work anymore, and they’ll need to get other jobs,” said one employee on the call. “Pretty soon they won’t be able to afford to work at the agency.”
“My heart’s breaking because I hear all this stuff across the country,” Sriubas responded. “We had to close an office in California today because we didn’t have enough people to open the doors … Nobody wants to close an office … But I also understand that people have to live their lives and they have limited means to do that when you’re now missing your second full paycheck.”
Another employee tells WIRED that some field offices have set up food pantries to help colleagues who are on the brink. “People are angry and … betrayed,” they added.
“I think I can speak for most of our employees when we say now more than ever, employees are feeling somewhat betrayed by the federal government as federal employees because of what we’re navigating and the length in which we’re navigating it,” said another employee on the call.
Most SSA employees are considered “excepted” from the shutdown, meaning they must continue to work without getting paid—or quit the agency altogether.
People can also be furloughed, but employees say they are nervous to ask for this option, for fear they won’t receive back pay when the government reopens. “I have employees that are skeptical and kind of scared, to be truthful, to use furlough because they’re not comfortable or confident that once the shutdown is over that they’re going to be compensated,” an employee said on the call.
Differing standards at the agency, which has roughly 51,000 employees, are also leading to contention. While SSA is allowing some employees to work remotely during this period, the number of days they’re allowed to do this is limited. “Telework will be infrequent, based on unique workload needs of the agency or due to the personal circumstances of the requesting employee, and limited in duration,” according to an employee contract viewed by WIRED. (“It’s become a big problem—and employees talk to each other. We need a hard and fast rule,” one manager tells WIRED.)
