Social Security Administration reviews

Terribly understaffed, unreasonable expectations based on staffing

Federal employees want to serve the public well as quickly as possible. We want to respond to any customer who comes through the door or calls on the phone. However, this agency is underfunded, staffing is at a 50 year low, and now hiring is frozen. Modernization and decision-making is usually glacially slow, sometimes due to budget issues and sometimes because of the ancient bureaucratic structure. Management tends to lack education in data analysis and current public policy innovations. Some sidewalks problems persist for years. Managers get shuffled from city to city and plugged into areas they know very little about, then they're kind of pushed around by the higher ups. The employees who interact with the public daily get blamed for inefficiencies that are out of their control. Sometimes presidents and Congress take steps to obstruct the work of the affect. Work/life balance is unstable since there's no guarantee telework will continue.