To commemorate this landmark birthday, we’ve re-published the open letter from Frank Bisignano, the agency’s current commissioner.
Today, we celebrate the 90th anniversary of Social Security—a program that has stood as a pillar
of economic security and dignity for generations of Americans.
When President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act into law in 1935, the
country was in the depths of the Great Depression. Millions of Americans had lost their jobs,
their homes, and their sense of security. President Roosevelt called the Act “a cornerstone in a
structure which is being built but is by no means complete.” He saw Social Security not only as a
tool for relief, but as a foundation for recovery and long-term resilience. It was a program that
would grow stronger with time.
Over the decades, Social Security has evolved to meet the changing needs of the country. What
began as a retirement program expanded to include survivor, family, and disability benefits. It
became a lifeline for widows, children who lost a parent, workers with disabilities, and millions
more. Through war, recession, demographic shifts, and economic change, Social Security has
endured. Because its strength lies not just in its design as an “earned benefit,” but in its
adaptability and in the shared commitment of the American people to look out for one another.
Ninety years in, we are proud stewards of that legacy. With over 300 million Social Security
Number (SSN) holders, Social Security serves nearly every American and is foundational to
retirement planning. The program pays $1.6 trillion in benefits each year. You’ve probably heard
people say that Social Security will not be there for you in the future. That’s not true. Under
current law, there is enough dedicated revenue for Social Security to continue paying full
benefits until 2034. After that, there would still be sufficient income to pay about 80 percent of
scheduled benefits into the future. Of course, Americans cannot afford a 20 percent reduction in
their Social Security benefits. That’s why Congress will act to shore up the program before any
shortfall occurs, just as they’ve done several times before over Social Security’s 90-year history.
President Trump has been resolute in his promise to protect and preserve Social Security. Last
month, the President delivered historic tax relief for America’s seniors when he signed the “One
Big Beautiful Bill” into law. A provision in the Bill eliminated federal income taxes on Social
Security for most beneficiaries, ensuring that retirees can keep more of the benefits they earned.
At the Social Security Administration (SSA), we are building the foundation to deliver on and
support President Trump’s promise. Our vision is to transform SSA into a model of excellence—
a digital-first agency that operates at peak efficiency and provides outstanding service to
everyone, whether they call, come into a field office, or choose to manage their benefits online.
Being good stewards of the hard-earned, taxpayer dollars entrusted to us is critical to everything
we do. Working with our independent Office of the Inspector General, we have moved at
unprecedented speed to resolve half the value of $18 billion in potential savings from
unimplemented audit recommendations within two months. We are continuing our drive to
resolve the other half. In addition, we have upgraded our authentication tools for serving you
online and over the phone to ensure we pay benefits only to those who are eligible to receive
them. The upgrades make it faster, more secure, and convenient for you to get help from SSA.
To eliminate the opportunity for fraud using SSNs, we added over 12.4 million individuals aged
120 and over to the Death Master File. Further, we partnered with the Department of Homeland
Security to update the records of 275,000 individuals no longer holding legal status, ensuring
those ineligible to receive benefits are not improperly paid.
As we safeguard benefits, we know we must also provide outstanding service to you on the
phones, in our 1,200 community-based field offices, and online. Our goal is to provide you an
excellent customer experience whenever you turn to us for help. Too often, SSA fell short of that
goal in recent years.
Instead, you experienced long wait times that caused frustration and reduced trust in a program
we cherish. The data speaks for itself. The average speed of answer on the National 800 Number
reached an all-time high of 42 minutes in November 2023; field office wait times spiked to 32
minutes in February 2024; and the disability claims backlog reached an all-time high of more
than 1.25 million in June 2024.
With a world-class management team now in place, we are fixing every one of these problems
and more. Working alongside SSA’s dedicated public servants, who have returned to the office 5
days a week to assist you, we have begun to transform SSA into a digital-first agency that meets
customers where they want to be met. By expanding technology throughout our operations and
leveraging better process engineering, we have created the capacity to serve more people than
ever while reducing wait times. Increasingly, this means that wherever you live and however you
choose to transact, SSA will deploy its available resources to assist you.
This is nowhere more evident than on our National 800 Number, where we have improved how
we use technology to enable 90 percent of calls handled to be served via automated self-service
options or convenient callbacks, minimizing caller wait times. Last year, callers experienced
answer times nearly 30 minutes on average. Today, answer times are in the single digits while
serving twice as many customers on average each day this year compared to the prior year. We
also achieved a 0 percent busy rate in a recent week while handling nearly 800,000 calls.
By providing better service over the phone, we create additional capacity to serve you when you
need to visit a field office. Before you make the trip, you can schedule an appointment, which
helps us plan for your arrival while ensuring you receive the fastest possible service. You can
schedule your appointment over the phone, as well as online for certain types of services like
enumeration. We expect to further expand our online scheduling tool so that you can schedule
appointments to file for benefits before the end of the year.
Due to our focus on assisting you with field office appointments, we have increased the share of
visitors with scheduled appointments to 30 percent this year, compared to only 6 percent last
year. This effectively means that five times more people now visit field offices with
appointments and wait on average just 6 minutes to be seen, compared to 28 minutes for visitors
without appointments. The net result is we have reduced the average wait time in field offices
from about 30 minutes last year to just over 20 minutes so far this year, or a nearly 30 percent
reduction.
Providing better service online creates further capacity to serve you on the phone and in offices.
Following my confirmation in early May, I learned that SSA’s online portal, my Social
Security, had scheduled downtime of 29 hours a week. This effectively meant that the portal
was offline 17 percent of the time, leaving you without instant access to your benefit
information. As of mid-July, that is no longer the case. Americans now have 24/7 access to their
Social Security information online. This enhancement enabled half a million more customers to
access their online accounts in the first three weeks alone. In addition, we increased the total
number of my Social Security account holders to 75 million. The growth in account holders,
combined with our increased engagement on the benefits of doing business online, enabled a 25
percent increase in daily online transactions so far this year compared to last. To build on these
gains, we set a bold goal to expand to 200 million my Social Security account holders by the
end of 2026.
As we have made these improvements across all of our service channels, we also tackled two of
the highest priority workloads in front of us—sending payments to beneficiaries eligible under
the Social Security Fairness Act (SSFA) and reducing the disability claims backlog.
In early July, we announced that we completed sending over 3.1 million payments, totaling over
$17 billion, to beneficiaries eligible under the SSFA, 5 months ahead of schedule. When the
SSFA became law on January 5, 2025, SSA identified about 2.8 million current Social Security
beneficiaries whose benefits were reduced because of the Windfall Elimination Provision (WEP)
or Government Pension Offset (GPO), including firefighters, police officers, teachers, and other
essential public servants. Through technology automation and prudent resource management, we
successfully completed actions on these beneficiaries’ records exceeding our original estimate of
it taking a year or more.
At the same time, we continued to drive down the disability claims backlog. We reduced the
disability claims backlog to 936,000 pending cases—or a 26 percent reduction from the all-time
high in June 2024. This is the lowest level in four years. We have also maintained historic lows
of disability hearings pending, with average wait times reduced by nearly 60 days since June
2024.
As we mark the 90th anniversary of Social Security, we are reminded of the enduring promise
made to the American people over nine decades and reaffirmed by President Trump in his pledge
to protect and preserve Social Security. The progress we have made in securing your benefits,
modernizing our services, and reducing wait times reflects our ongoing commitment to that
promise. Just as Social Security has adapted and strengthened over the past nine decades, we
remain dedicated to ensuring its continued vitality.
We know there is more work to do. But with the trust of the American people, the support of our
dedicated employees, and the commitment of our nation’s leaders, we are confident that Social
Security will remain a cornerstone of economic security for another 90 years and beyond.
Thank you for allowing us to serve you and for being part of this historic legacy. We know that
you are depending on us, and we will deliver.
Sincerely,
Frank J. Bisignano