Mark Miller

1 week ago | retirementrevised.substack.com | Mark Miller

In the world of funhouse mirrors that is the Trump administration, it’s difficult to keep straight what exactly we should be worried about when it comes to Social Security and dead people. First, it was millions of 150-year-olds receiving benefits despite (presumably) having died (false). Now, the administration has taken the unprecedented step of adding the names of living persons to what’s known as the SSA Death Master File.

1 week ago | reuters.com | Mark Miller

MOSCOW, April 15 (Reuters) - Four Russian journalists were sentenced by a Moscow court to 5-1/2 years each in prison on Tuesday after being found guilty of working for the banned organisation of the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny, Russian news outlets said. Antonina Favorskaya, Sergei Karelin, Konstantin Gabov and Artem Kriger have been on trial behind closed doors since October on charges, which they deny, of belonging to an extremist group. Sign up here.

1 week ago | nytimes.com | Mark Miller

An award-winning director, he created memorable ads for brands like Diet Pepsi and Wells Fargo by applying a Hollywood sensibility to the small screen. Rick Levine, an award-winning television commercial director who brought a big-screen sensibility to the small screen with widely celebrated spots, like a Diet Pepsi Super Bowl ad from the 1980s featuring Michael J. Fox risking life and limb for love, died on March 11 at his home in Marina del Rey, Calif. He was 94.

2 weeks ago | retirementrevised.substack.com | Mark Miller

These days, you really need to stay on top of developments at the Social Security Administration. The news has been breaking . . . fast and furious, let’s say. Today’s newsletter on how to navigate SSA chaos - which I sent less than an hour ago - included discussion of the agency’s plans to sharply curtail transactions available through its toll-free line. But it turns out the agency this week decided to back off that plan.

2 weeks ago | retirementrevised.substack.com | Mark Miller

Customer service at the Social Security Administration has been bad for years - and now it’s getting worse. Elon Musk’s DOGE initiative is leading a Trump administration plan to reduce the SSA workforce by 7,000 people - roughly 12% of the workforce - through voluntary separation or firings, and limiting the scope of services available through the toll-free phone line in a way that is expected to force a much larger number of people to visit overworked field offices to transact business.