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A Little Learning: All You Need to Know about Section 301

Mar 8, 2024

This week we’re going to hand over the blogging reins to the inestimable Mabel Munoz, Maryland Employment Network’s Lead Benefits Counselor. She recently provided a wonderful factsheet on Section 301 which you can read below in all its pellucid glory. What does...

Beneficiary Beware: Slam the Scam 2024

Mar 1, 2024

Yes, it’s that time of year again. Social Security have been in a constant battle to make everyone aware of the ever-present and ever-real threat of scammers targeting beneficiaries and doing their utmost to part them with their hard-earned cash. Each March the...

Soup’s On: Nutrition Services for Older Marylanders

Feb 23, 2024

Thanks to the increasingly mature Older Americans Act (OAA), instituted back in 1965, there have been funds available to every state in the land to provide nutrition services to those approaching the autumn of their lives. In Maryland, as in many states, that means...

Break Time: The Earned Income Tax Credit in 2024

Feb 14, 2024

Tax deadline day is fast approaching so it would certainly seem to be an appropriate time to highlight a little tax break that’s out there for those of us who are working and have ‘low to moderate’ income, in the parlance of the IRS. The Earned Income Tax Credit...

Reader Request: MDBCN Wants to Know What You Want to Know

Feb 2, 2024

Undeterred by the modest response to last year’s request for feedback and suggestions we once again ask you, valued and worthy reader, what you would like to know more about. If you have any topics that you think might deserve a spotlight shone on them, whether they...

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Working Works: It’s Still National Disability Employment Awareness Month

One would like to imagine that it was a failing of this writer's observational powers rather than the lack of promotional ability of the organizers that, but for a fruitless quest for HP sauce* at a local Wegman’s I would not have known that this rapidly diminishing...

COLAs for 2027 Announced!

Social Security published its 2027 Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) earlier this week. As is almost invariably the case monthly benefit payments will be higher, this year to the tune of 3.6%. For SSI recipients it means that the Federal Benefit Rate (FBR) will rise...

Goodnight, Virginia: SSA Closes VCU’s National Training Center

It was announced last Monday that the WIPA National Training and Data Center, would be shut down with immediate effect. The NTC, which was under the auspices of Virginia Commonwealth University, has been a primary source of training, education and support of Work...

In Exile: Impending Medicaid Eligibility Denials for Non-Citizens

Emma Lazarus’ 1883 sonnet ‘The New Colossus’ was written in the same year that she established in New York the Society for the Improvement and Colonization of East European Jews; an organization designed to provide aid to refugees escaping antisemitic violence and...

Education Matters: Maintaining Child’s Benefits at 18

Much to the dismay of students and teachers, another summer vacation has come and gone and one must again spend those long hours in the classroom looking wistfully out of the window as someone whitters on about some nonsense or other. For a small but significant...

In The Loop: SSA Changes Policy on Re-routing Calls

As anyone who has been obliged to call Social Security knows, the wait time has been prohibitively long. In the last year of the Biden administration the average wait was 60 minutes, which was bad enough, but in 2025 under the present regime that had increased to a...

An August Occasion: Celebrating National ABLE Savings Day

This year August 14 marks, amongst other notable events, the 236th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Väräla which brought about an end to the Russo-Swedish War; exactly 124 years later the arrival of British Expeditionary Force in France saw the beginning of...

Priority Treatment: SSA Adds to the Compassionate Allowance List

A fresh press release from Social Security will provide some good news to potential beneficiaries who experience a range of disabilities. Fourteen relatively obscure conditions have been added to the agency’s Compassionate Allowance policy. The policy allows Social...

Won’t Get Food Again: SNAP Eligibility in Decline

Recent articles in The Atlantic and by NPR have highlighted the growing concern in the reduction in the number of food stamp beneficiaries over the past year. The current figure, as estimated by the Department of Agriculture, stands at around 37 million recipients,...

Hear Ye, Hear Ye: Social Security Adds New Features to MySSA Accounts

A recent press release from Social Security looked to encourage applicants who have found themselves having to appeal a denial to use a My Social Security account when working through that process. Evidently very keen on getting you on board, the agency has produced a...