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Disability claimants wait ... and wait
Social Security cards
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TEXT OF STORY
KAI RYSSDAL: Here's today's Marketplace trivia question. The first one to get it right -- as judged by the time stamp on the e-mail -- gets my voice on their home answering machine. What's the official name of Social Security?
I'll take a beat here while you think. If you need a hint, the acronym is OASDI -- old age, survivors and disability insurance.
Most of us know about the old age and survivors benefits. But there are about 7 million Americans who collect disability benefits from the Social Security Administration every month. Every year, another 2.5 million people apply.
Which brings us to the problem. There's a backlog of 750,000 people trying to prove they deserve those disability payments. Later this month Congress is going to weigh in on what to do about it.
Marketplace's Nancy Marshall-Genzer reports.
MARSHALL GENZER: When the Social Security disability program started, in the 1950s, it was aimed at blue collar workers with obvious injuries. Government newsreels described it this way.
NEWSREEL: Today, a new car comes off the assembly line every 48 seconds. These are the men and women who have Social Security protection, in case sickness or accident causes a disability that is so severe that earning a living is no longer possible.
Today, a lot of people with hard-to-prove illnesses apply for disability benefits. They have Lupus or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Social Security sees them as borderline cases. So, they're often denied.
But once applicants get a chance to appeal to a judge, two thirds of them win. If they lose, they can appeal again. That swells the backlog even more.
Judge Robert Habermann hears disability cases in Roanoke, Va., and is an officer in the judge's union. He says the Social Security Administration is pressuring judges to just ram through positive decisions.
ROBERT HABERMANN: It solves a lot of problems by just paying the case. The individual claimant is out of the system. In other words, there are no appeals.
Haberman says those positive decisions could stack up to billions of dollars in wasted taxpayer money.
MICHAEL ASTRUE: Well I've heard that as a union line, but that's just not true.
That's Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue. Astrue says he can't, and doesn't tell judges how to decide cases. He says the problem is a shortage of judges and very uneven productivity. The Social Security Administration now encourages each of its nearly 1,200 judges to hear 500 to 700 cases per year.
MICHAEL ASTRUE: We've had judges who decided no cases in a year. And we've had judges that have fairly chronically decided double digits -- 40 cases a year.
All told, the judges hear more than a half a million cases per year. But that's not enough to get through the backlog. Astrue wants to up the number of judges and their productivity to eliminate the backlog in about five years.
And Astrue says judges aren't just ramming through positive decisions, either. Forty-six-year-old Karen Ierardi can attest to that. At her hearing this year, a judge denied her disability benefits.
KAREN IERARDI: I just felt that he didn't understand it, what I'd been through. And I don't think he had a lot of knowledge of the disease itself that I had been going through.
Ierardi has rheumatoid arthritis and so she was a borderline case. She had to quit her job as a substitute teacher in a suburb of Richmond, Va. Now she lives with her mother in a cramped apartment.
Ierardi and her mother have racked up thousands of dollars in credit card debt paying for groceries and gas. Ierardi still can't work. She's appealing her denial once again.
So what's the answer? People with difficult cases like Ierardi's want a fair hearing. Judges shouldn't take too long or feel rushed.
Commissioner Astrue has begun hiring more judges. The first group started this month. He's asking Congress for millions of dollars to hire a second batch of judges. But it's an election year. So it's not likely Congress will act anytime soon.
Social Security claimants stuck in the backlog, will just have to wait. And wait. And wait.
In Washington, I'm Nancy Marshall Genzer for Marketplace.
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I applied for Social Security Disability in 1991. I was honorably discharged from military in 1989. A civilian doc diagnosed me with a disabling disease (caused by the experimental military VACCINES). The VA rates me as a 100% "Service-Connected" disabled American vet, yet refuses to assign an Earlier Effective date consistent with my service (1987-1989). The SSA medical examiner, Alfred Zamora, MD, Milwaukee, WI, determined in 1991 I am disabled, but systemic incompetence & dishonesty rules. The ALJ was inconsistent in his reason for denial. On one hand asserting the record lacked OBJECT evidence, but then ordering a highly controversial SUBJECTIVE exam (MMPI) This M.O. was of using psychiatric exams to discredit people with knowledge of official misconduct was exposed by A CURRENT AFFAIR, June 18, 1993 in A SOLDIER'S STORY (Evans). It is also well documented by Gary Null in his video: Gulf War Syndrome, featuring a disabled Colonel who faces an overly adversarial & abusive VA claims process. For proof of abuse, Google: Kenneth Tennant to see what happened abusive gov't officials did to intimidate him into silence. They terrorized his two children and wife who was vomitting in distress. Some one in the SSA needs to have a Fair & Impartial Decision Review Officer to re-open his claim and correct the clear & unmistakable errors.
I applied for Social Security Disability in 1991. I was honorably discharged from military in 1989. A civilian doc diagnosed me with a disabling disease (caused by the experimental military VACCINES). The VA rates me as a 100% "Service-Connected" disabled American vet, yet refuses to assign an Earlier Effective date consistent with my service (1987-1989). The SSA medical examiner, Alfred Zamora, MD, Milwaukee, WI, determined in 1991 I am disabled, but systemic incompetence & dishonesty rules. The ALJ was inconsistent in his reason for denial. On one hand asserting the record lacked OBJECT evidence, but then ordering a highly controversial SUBJECTIVE exam (MMPI) This M.O. was of using psychiatric exams to discredit people with knowledge of official misconduct was exposed by A CURRENT AFFAIR, June 18, 1993 in A SOLDIER'S STORY (Evans). It is also well documented by Gary Null in his video: Gulf War Syndrome, featuring a disabled Colonel who faces an overly adversarial & abusive VA claims process. For proof of abuse, Google: Kenneth Tennant to see what happened abusive gov't officials did to intimidate him into silence. They terrorized his two children and wife who was vomitting in distress. Some one in the SSA needs to have a Fair & Impartial Decision Review Officer to re-open his claim and correct the clear & unmistakable errors.
I'm 42 and worked hard all of my life until I got sick a few years ago. I applied for disability, Got turned down. Didn't get a Lawyer. Applied again, Turned down. No Lawyer. I applied again and got a Lawyer. It went all the way through to the Appeals Council in Falls Church, Va. They refused to Review the Judges decision? I have lost EVERYTHING I WORKED SO HARD FOR. I have Agoraphobia, P.T.S.D., Survivors guilt, Clinical depression, Social anxiety, Panic and anxiety disorder and for those unfamiliar with Agoraphobia? It means I can't leave my Home. Only to go to my Psych. appointments and that's hell. I now live with my elderly Mother who is on a fixed income. I just don't understand why it's so hard to get help if you deserve it? I had a good paying job and have paid my share of taxes. I have NO LIFE. This whole process they put you through only extenuates the stress. I truly am at a total loss? You have to leave your Home to work? I have already had one nervous breakdown. I don't know how much more I can take?
A friend of mine was just denied. She has serious neck problems and severe pain. Is unable to lift anything heavy and can barely do a 6 hour shift as a cashier. She was sexually abused as a child and has social problems because of this. It was the state of Va that placed her with a pedophile when she was 5. The only jobs they told her she could do are simple and DO NOT exist in this day and age.
I had 2 neighbors on disability selling oxycontin. Apparently the drug dealers are the only people who get disability in this backwards country. I want Mr. Habermann to contact me and check why these 2 people are still receiving their checks as one of them is a convicted felon who was caught selling the drugs the disability system gave him. My friend will probably commit suicide to end the pain. Thank you Mr. Habermann and America. Great country we live in.
I first applied for ss in 2000 here it is april 2009 i was turned down 3 time and finally went before a judge in march 2009 i tryied to work cant keep a job have been homeless for 14 yrs tryed living with children was abused by them finally my husband left me for a nother woman young enogh to be our child and i had to leave my children and move in with someone because i cant support my self i have lost everything waiting and in my hearing the judge ask the voc rehab guy if there was any jobs i can do and the voc rehab guy said your honor there is no jobs she can do with her medical condition so i am still waiting for a decision i am wondering if i finally going to get it. before i die i am having blood clots to my brain and passing out i blacked out while i was trying to get home does any one know what that meant when the judge ask the voc rehab if i could work i am praying
I was turned down for disability after my hearing. The judge was picking out small comments from one doctor and ignoring his diagnosis and other tests that I had done. We are appealing, but I'm not holding my breath on that one. I think he didn't understand TBI and mental illness at all. Meanwhile, I still can't work and never will again. Thank God my husband has a pension. If he dies, I may as well die too because I will be homeless.
I was a victim of a unfair hearing, Have been informed by a few of my doctors I will not be able to work any longer. I suffer from DJD,Achilles Tendonitis, Bulging Disk in lower back and Anxiety Disorder. My doctor filled out a form indicated I needed personal assistance in providing my household chores, I cannot do anything except lye in bed for more pain relief. Taking the highest narcotics on the market, high dose and still does not take the pain completely away. Cause severe drowiness, mental cloudness etc.. Was denied my Hearing by a Judge I know did not review my files, indicated I can preform house duties which noted in my file I cannot, the judge did not know what the drug Embrel was, was not fimular with the disease and how it affects ones lives. Now I'm suffering from Bipolar Disorder which was submitted as new evidence and the severity of the illness. I do understand how all of you feel, it's just wrong we have to suffer for poor and in proper knowledge. Lost everything, submitted several Dire Needs, the most severe was a house fire which I lost from fire and finances. I waiting for an Appeal right to this very day. Been waiting quite a while. Prayer is my only hope.
HAVING STOOD IN THE SSDI waiting line since early 2005, I've had plenty of time to consider some (slightly paranoid) ideas, most of which I will spare you. One theory is that the current Admin. wishes to give Wall Street a portion of Social Security funds. The more delays in awarding SSDI benefits to claimants, the more money there will be for Wall Street. Anyway, I wish there was some way of knowing where my case # is on the backlog list and if I can do anything to help expedite this process. BTW, I was one who participated in a state sponsored Voc. Rehab. program. It was somewhat helpful because I was able to get desperately needed medical assistance, but it was much less helpful as far as financial survival goes, in that it was determined that I wasn't fit even for '"sedentary" gainful employment'. Really, if you haven't been there, you just don't know. I am extremely concerned about whether an ALJ (my next step, someday) will OK me for disability. From everything I have heard or read about this process, it's a matter of sheer dumb luck. So, if anyone knows a helpful witch-doc or effective juju charm, please let me know.
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