Security Administration's workload burdens, and increase administrative costs under annual reporting by about $4 million a year. Mr. FLOOD. Thank you, gentlemen. USE OF 9- BY 12-INCH ENVELOPES TO MAIL NEWS RELEASES Mr. FLOOD. We will include at this point a letter from my colleague, Mr. Giaimo, asking about certain SSA mailing practices and the answer of the Department. [The letter follows:] CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, Washington, D.C., March 26, 1976. Hon. DANIEL FLOOD, Chairman, Labor-HEW Subcommittee, DEAR MR. CHAIRMAN: It has come to my attention that the Social Security Administration (SSA) uses 9- by 12-inch envelopes to mail news releases printed on standard letter-size paper. According to the information which I have received, a letter size envelope costs a nongovernmental organization about eighttenths of a cent, while a 9- by 12-inch envelope costs 4.4 cents each. I was also told that, according to the postal scale, the first-class postage on a 9- by 12-inch envelope is 24 cents as opposed to 13 cents for a standard letter-size envelope. Using these figures, a mailing of 1,000 news releases using the large envelopes costs $284, but it would cost only $138 if the standard letter-size envelopes were used. In other words, the Social Security Administration seems to be spending more than twice the amount of money it could spend for these mailings. I realize that you have concluded your hearings on the Social Security Administration's budget for fiscal year 1977; nevertheless, I would appreciate your asking the appropriate officials to comment on this allegation for the record. If this charge is accurate and if other departments and agencies engage in the same practice, we have a situation in which hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars are being wasted each year. With best wishes, Sincerely yours, SSA RESPONSE ROBERT N. GIAIMO. The addressees for these particular mailings are on a list which includes a large number of organizations, many of whom receive multiple copies of publications of various sizes. We use envelopes that can accommodate multiple copies because the envelopes are addressed by a machine which handles only one size at a time. It is less expensive to use some oversize envelopes than it would be to manually sort through the mailing list to select an appropriate envelope for each addressee. a. b. Federal payments for supplementary medical insurance. 10 14 DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, EDUCATION, AND WELFARE SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION Payments to Social Security Trust [and Other] Funds For payment to the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance, the Federal Disability Insurance, the Federal Hospital Insurance, and the Federal Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Funds, as provided under sections 217(g), 228(8), 229(b), and 1844 of the Social Security Act, and sections 103(c) and 111(d) of the Social Security Amendments of 1965, [$4,112,747,000] $6,713,902,000 [and to the Federal Buildings Fund an additional amount not to exceed $10,616,000 for payment of the Standard Level User Charge pursuant to section 210(j) of the Federal Property and Administrative Services Act of 1949]. 1/ (Department of Health, Education, and Welfare Appropriation Act, 1976.). Explanation of Language Changes The activity "Payment to the Federal Buildings Fund" has been removed from this year's appropriation and the appropriation title has been amended accordingly by striking out "and Other. "Payment to the Federal Buildings Fund" was to be the mechanism whereby social security trust fund programs and the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program would pay the General Services Administration (GSA) that portion of the standard level users charge, a charge imposed by GSA for space and services provided to SSA, which was in excess, of the actual cost of such space and services. The Congress, in reviewing SSA's 1976 appropriation request decided that social security trust fund programs should not, through any mechanism, pay more than actual cost of space and services. It removed all funds targeted for the Federal Buildings Fund from this appropriation except for those dealing with the SSI program, which is a Federal rather than a trust fund program. In order to keep all SSI costs together, these funds are requested in the Salaries and Expenses appropriation with reimbursement to the trust funds through the SSI appropriation's administrative cost activity for this and all other SSI costs. We have done this beginning in fiscal year 1977. 1/ These numbers represent the amounts approved by Congress for 1976, as well as adjustments of +$9,000,000 for Federal payments for supplementary medical insurance and +$29,000,000 for hospital insurance for the uninsured. These adjustments were made to reflect current estimates of program expenditures. 2/ This number represents the change (1977 over 1976) in adjustments related to prior years costs as described below. |