BELOW SUPERNAV drop zone ⇩

Social Security updates job list to evaluate disability benefits

  • SSA announces change to people qualify for disability benefits
  • The SSA dropped 114 roles, including scuba divers
  • Levin Center: 'Changes will ease lives for millions'

MAIN AREA TOP drop zone ⇩

MAIN AREA TOP drop zone ⇩

Testing widget old system

Lorenzo shared

Mortgage Calculator

This calculator helps you estimate your monthly mortgage payment. It adds up the loan payment (principal + interest), property tax, and insurance. The loan payment is spread out over the years of your loan term.

This is the total amount you're borrowing from the bank.
This is the yearly interest rate on your loan.
This is how long you'll take to repay the loan.
This is the yearly tax you pay on your property.
This is the yearly cost to insure your home.

Monthly Payment Breakdown

Principal and Interest: $

Property Tax: $

Homeowners Insurance: $

Total Estimated Monthly Payment: $

(NewsNation) — The Social Security Administration has announced a major change that could help more people qualify for disability benefits.

When applicants say they cannot work, the agency compares their claim to a list of jobs that are abundant in the country to see if they could reasonably perform them and stay off government payments. But many have argued the list is out of date, and the administration now says it’s been modernized.

The SSA dropped 114 roles, including agricultural engineers, astronomers and scuba divers, which only “exist in very limited numbers, if at all.”

“Based on this finding, the agency will not use these occupations to support a “not disabled” finding at the last step in the evaluation process for disability determinations,” the SSA said in a statement.

The move is meant to help SSA be more specific when deciding if someone who is applying for disability benefits can hold other jobs.

Critics have called the SAA database “unfair and flawed,” CBS News reported. “It was last updated in 1977 and includes dozens of obsolete occupations.”

“It makes sense to identify occupations that now exist in very limited numbers in the national economy,” Martin O’Malley, commissioner of Social Security, said in a statement. “By making this update, our decision-makers will no longer cite these jobs when denying a disability application.”

It’s part of the agency’s push to streamline the application process. They also announced they’re trimming the required work history for applicants from 15 years down to five.

The Levin Center for Oversight and Democracy posted on X that these changes will “ease life for millions.”

Your Money

Copyright 2024 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed

Site Settings Survey

 

MAIN AREA MIDDLE drop zone ⇩

Trending on NewsNation

MAIN AREA BOTTOM drop zone ⇩

tt

KC Chiefs parade shooting: 1 dead, 21 shot including 9 kids | Morning in America

Witness of Chiefs parade shooting describes suspect | Banfield

Kansas City Chiefs parade shooting: Mom of 2 dead, over 20 shot | Banfield

WWE star Ashley Massaro 'threatened' by board to keep quiet about alleged rape: Friend | Banfield

Friend of WWE star: Ashley Massaro 'spent hours' sobbing after alleged rape | Banfield

Cloudy

la

64°F Cloudy Feels like 64°
Wind
2 mph E
Humidity
79%
Sunrise
Sunset

Tonight

Partly cloudy early with increasing clouds overnight. Low 61F. Winds light and variable.
61°F Partly cloudy early with increasing clouds overnight. Low 61F. Winds light and variable.
Wind
6 mph W
Precip
8%
Sunset
Moon Phase
Waning Gibbous