SSDI

A recent piece in the Huffington Posts demonstrates the absurdity of a proposal to cut $752 million dollars from the “program integrity” department of the Social Security Administration. The department is responsible for periodic reviews of recipients’ continued income eligibility and medical status. According to the article, Social Security Chief Actuary Stephen Gross estimates that every dollar spent on reviews saves $6, while each dollar spent on SSI redeterminations saves $9. So, the proposed $752 million cut could end up costing $5 to $6 billion dollars.

Frank Bruni of the New York Times published an op-ed arguing that the tripling of persons receiving Social Security disability benefits is being caused, in part, by those who are “gaming the system.” David Vogner of the Huffington Post published his own opinion on the HuffPost’s blog rebutting Mr. Bruni’s opinion, asserting that the increase in recipients is a result of claimants being unable to find employment. One of Mr. Vogner’s counterpoints to Mr. Bruni’s pejorative description of Social Security disability recipients deserves to be highlighted and clarified: Social Security Disability Income Benefits (DIB) are only paid to those who have paid enough into Social Security. Mr. Vogner’s defense of Social Security overlooks Mr. Bruni’s misleading reference to the federal Treasury; disability payments come from FICA and Self Employment Contribution taxes and the Disability Insurance Trust Fund, a separate account within the Treasury that is funded by FICA and Self Employment Contribution taxes. Semantically, some DIB payments come from the Treasury, but the whole truth omitted by Mr. Bruni is that DIB recipients are paid from the same account those recipients paid into when they were working – one could argue that Mr. Bruni is using a straw man argument to make his point.

Pierce asserts that the treating physician rule should be rescinded because, in part, too many people are being awarded disability as a result of this rule.  Basically, the rule states that great weight should be afforded the opinion of a treating source opinion regarding his patient’s ability to work.  The reasoning behind the rule is sound.  A treating physician, provided he has a sufficient treating relationship in regards to the amount of time and frequency of visits, is in the best position to judge his patient’s limitations. Pierce further argues that getting rid of the treating physician rule would take away one of the tools that unscrupulous attorneys are now exploiting in order to gain advantage for their clients, forcing SSA to allow more claims and costing the government money in benefits as well as attorney fees.  This argument turns the fact finding nature of the disability determination on its head. First of all, the treating physician rule is not an absolute, there are factors to be considered in determining how much weight should be given a doctors opinion.  In this fact finding process, fortunately, representatives realize that the person to best judge a person’s limitations is his treating doctor. The fact that an attorney can reach out on his clients behalf, to treating sources, and solicit these opinions, is vital to the disability process.  Given the nature of this process, it seems that this further case development should be praised rather than vilified. Case developers at DDS are overworked to the point where such information is rarely, if ever, solicited. Pierce argues that the treating physician rule puts the ALJ in a difficult position because the cases have already been reviewed by a case examiner and medical expert (neither whom have ever met the claimant).  Interestingly, Pierce admits that an ALJ has the difficult task of determining the extent of a claimant’s mental or physical limitations, and that his solution is to take away the one opinion which will shed the best light on a claimant’s limitations.  The fact that these doctor’s opinions may lead to more disabled people actually being found….well…disabled, should not be a deterrent to applying the rule and letting the disability chip fall where they should, and not as a result of the whim of a financial concern

A brief opinion piece in the Washington Post today questions the Social Security system, but suggests no solutions. http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/charles-lane-social-security-disability-insurances-incentive-not-to-work/2012/07/30/gJQA8UvHLX_story.html?wpisrc=emailtoafriend