Will Royce

Spoiler alert, but the answer is basically: (1) no one knows for sure, need more data; (2) definitely not the labor market; (3) probably DOGE

New post, in which I finally answer the question on everybody's mind: Why Are Disability Claims Down?
willroyce.substack.com/p/why-are-di...

Re: the provisions that prevent RIFs for the duration of the CR, any reason Trump admin won't contest that in court? Is that a thing that has been done before? Difficult to see how an admin that argues impoundments are lawful would accede to limits on their ability to fire fed workers?

‘A Big Positive’: How One Company Plans to Profit From Medicaid Cuts New work requirements are expected to leave millions of poor Americans uninsured. For Equifax, which charges states steep prices for its trove of employment data, it is a business opportunity.

New work requirements for Medicaid are expected to leave millions of Americans uninsured. For Equifax, which charges states steep prices for its trove of employment data, it is a business opportunity.

Poverty is a common, often temporary experience — though more common and less temporary for some

Does anyone know how someone could go from being on Medicare to being uninsured? (Besides being a data error)

Here's a cool chart that I didn't include in the post

Some things to keep in mind

-Sep 30: USDA releases guidance saying they can use contingency fund
-Oct 10: USDA tells states to prepare for lapse
-Oct 23: USDA deletes guidance saying they can use contingency fund
-Oct 24: USDA says it can’t use contingency fund
-Oct 31: Courts tell USDA to release funds
-Nov 1: no funds go out

The Bathtub Model of Everything Statuses, not characteristics.

new post

The Good Samaritan, by Joseph Highmore, 1744, 📸 by @patricksmith04

On The Everything App, you get 11k retweets for saying that SNAP spending went up under Biden because of illegal immigration.

Real answer: we increased benefit amounts during COVID, starting under Trump. Not the greatest information environment over there.

Fed Making Key Economic Decisions Without Key Economic Data - The American Prospect The Fed considers information from a variety of sources in setting monetary policy, everything from anecdotal reports to original data produced by its regional Reserve Banks. But the loss of public, a...

The Fed lacks gold-standard data that inform its monetary policy decisions, due to the shutdown.
They had a secret deal with ADP for granular private data.
But a Fed governor revealed the collaboration in a speech, so ADP got mad and cut the Fed off.
A laugh-before-crying story from me:

@ lawmakers please start thinking about the next Comptroller General www.politico.com/news/2025/09...

Seam bias is killing me

Something I found out while doing research for this is that bonuses are particularly large/common in March. Didn't know that. Kinda interesting.

Also some larger issues: Among ABAWDs who were on Medicaid for all of 2023 and had *average* monthly earnings that satisfied OBBBA work requirements, 25% failed to satisfy work requirements in at least one month of the year.

I wrote about a small, dumb issue with work requirements. States should avoid measuring work hours just at the level of the *calendar* month, since, you know, one month is shorter than the others. willroyce.substack.com/p/work-requi...

CMS Extends Georgia’s Medicaid Waiver Program, Despite GAO Report Raising Concerns with Costs | Center on Budget and Policy Priorities September 23, 2025: A new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) raising concerns about the cost of Georgia’s Pathways to Coverage Medicaid waiver program is a forewarning about how ex...

Reports raise red flags: Georgia spent $54M on admin costs for its #Medicaid waiver, nearly twice the $26M spent on care, while enrolling under 3,500 people. CMS still extended the costly program that ties coverage to work requirements. www.cbpp.org/research/fed...

Always funny to get updates from DOGE

Apparently I accidentally stole the color scheme for my Substack from Baker McKenzie

Americans increasingly see legal sports betting as a bad thing for society and sports Today, 43% of U.S. adults say the fact that sports betting is now legal in much of the country is a bad thing for society, up from 34% in 2022.

% of US men under 30 who say legal sports betting is a *bad thing* for society

22% in 2022
47% in 2025

No other demographic group has seen a bigger increase.

A graph of JOLTS data

NEW

US labor market flows remained sluggish in August, as hiring slowed to the lowest level since early COVID

The hiring rate fell to 3.2%, layoffs fell to 1.1%, quits fell to 1.9%, and job openings rose to 4.3%

Really interesting story in @404media.co on how lawyers explain themselves when they are caught using AI-hallucinated citations www.404media.co/18-lawyers-c...

Thankfully we have 37 years to address this, assuming 2% inflation

It would be really funny (tragic) if the max SSI benefit amount surpassed $2,000 without Congress altering the asset limit. An SSI beneficiary would presumably be made ineligible for SSI benefits upon receiving them.

POLITICO Pro: Shutdown would impact nutrition benefits for moms, babies within days A signature program that serves millions of people may run out of money in one week. The White House says it could be even faster than that.

A government shutdown is looming.

If it happens, the nation’s top nutrition program for low-income moms and babies will run out of $$ within days.

Story for @politico.com w/ Rachel Shin

subscriber.politicopro.com/article/2025...

One weird trick to getting your insured unemployment rate down, and thereby making it unlikely that extended benefits will trigger in your state: Administer unemployment benefits as a lump sum rather than a weekly payment. (Or just cut the duration of benefits. That works too.)

The Weird Way We Automatically Extend Unemployment Benefits The “insured unemployment rate” plays an important role in our unemployment insurance system. Should it?

The "insured unemployment rate" is a strange metric to use for automatically extending unemployment benefits. But that's exactly what we do. I wrote about it. Lots of charts, if you're into that sort of thing.

Presenting MAKESHIFT ARRANGEMENTS A newsletter about the administration of the welfare state.

I'm starting a newsletter (ik, ik) focused on the administration of the welfare state. It's called Makeshift Arrangements, which is a reference to my favorite Frances Perkins quote. First full piece out tomorrow.

Read more below! Free to subscribe, and hey, you can always just unsubscribe later.