The Wall Street Journal recently posted an article about all the changes Social Security was planning on making to its disability programs. Here is a closer look at what the newspaper reported.
Case Loads: Social Security has set a limit to how many cases an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) can adjudicate a year at 800. This may seem like a lot, but several years ago some judges were handling more than 1,000 cases. This new development has to make people wonder whether the backlog of cases may even increase more now.
Doctors and Attorneys: Social Security and its inspector general are launching an initiative to weed out any fraud in the system and will be looking specifically at third-party claims. No reports or findings are yet available, so it is not clear how this new initiative will impact the Social Security disability process.
Disclosure: Agency officials have announced that a new rule will soon be proposed that will prevent claimants and third parties from withholding information that might be damaging to a case. Disability cases are based on medical evidence, good or bad, and a favorable decision on a case usually comes down to the credible medical evidence provided.
ALJ Description: Social Security has announced that it is changing its job description of administrative law judges to make it clear that even ALJs, who are usually the deciding factor in many disability cases, are subject to different levels of supervision. Under these new changes Social Security promises to offer more scrutiny on approval ratings based on the number of applicants.
Disability Job Listings: Most applicants are unaware that Social Security’s listing of potential jobs disability applicants may or may not be able to perform is outdated. The list of jobs has not been updated in more than 20 years and does not account for the technology boom in recent years. When someone applies for disability benefits, the agency considers whether the person can do any job in their local area. By updating the job listings, it would potentially include more jobs applicants are capable of performing. Of course, a task of updating all listed jobs is a monumental task that Social Security estimates won’t be completed until at least 2016.
The Grid: To determine whether an applicant is disabled, ALJs use what is commonly referred to as a “grid” to determine whether applicants are eligible for benefits. The “grid” system is heavily weighted to the age of the applicant to determine eligibility for benefits. Social Security hasn’t updated the grid, like the job listings, in many years. There is speculation that a new “grid” system could take into account that some people are working well into their 60s and 70s these days.
To learn more about potential changes that could take place in upcoming years to Social Security’s disability programs, according to The Wall Street Journal click here.
