During the government shutdown lasting 43 days in the fall of 2025, a serious issue regarding Social Security Administration (SSA) employee compensation surfaced. Although many SSA personnel are designated as "essential employees," requiring their presence even without pay during the shutdown, their financial situations were exposed as fragile. While higher-salaried employees may have managed the period by using emergency savings, numerous others found themselves unable to withstand the financial strain. Instances of hardships such as evictions, vehicle repossessions, and forgoing groceries became increasingly common among these workers.
Prompted by these reports, the Strategic Organizing Center (SOC), a coalition of unions in the United States, conducted an analysis concerning the earnings of more than 36,000 frontline SSA employees represented by the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE). The SOC's findings highlighted that over half of these workers (54%) receive wages below what is considered a living wage—defined as the minimum income required for a full-time employee to cover basic necessities such as housing, healthcare, food, and transportation. It is important to note that this living wage varies significantly depending on geographic location.
The implications are notable: more than half of the full-time SSA employees do not earn sufficient income to meet essential living costs in their respective areas. The challenges these employees face are compounded by their household responsibilities; three-quarters of SSA workers with dependents report being the primary breadwinner. Despite their routine engagement with retirees through their work, these employees may struggle with planning adequately for their own retirement due to financial constraints.
Adding to these pressures, the SSA reduced its workforce by 7,000 positions in early 2025. This reduction left the remaining employees to manage increased workloads. According to Wendell Primus, a visiting fellow at the Center on Health Policy at the Brookings Institution, these staff cuts have exacerbated existing backlogs and staffing inadequacies. "They cannot compensate for the loss of 7,000 staff with this approach," Primus mentioned, emphasizing the existing need for increased personnel prior to the reductions.
In the context of employee relations, while unions such as the AFGE are empowered to negotiate working conditions, they lack authority to negotiate wages and job classifications for federal workers. This limitation restricts their ability to address wage concerns directly.
An evaluation of worker wages by title, as of August 2025, underlines the pay disparities faced by SSA employees. The data indicates large proportions of certain job titles earning below a local living wage:
- Social insurance specialists: 32% of 19,178 workers earn below living wage.
- Contact representatives: 97% of 8,246 workers earn below living wage.
- Legal administrative specialists: 89% of 3,252 workers earn below living wage.
- Legal assistants: 97% of 1,459 workers earn below living wage.
This wage insufficiency presents serious challenges for many SSA employees in terms of securing financial stability and planning for the future. The disparity between wages and living costs threatens the economic health of workers tasked with administering vital social security programs.