Social Security Admin Removing Largely Obsolete Jobs from Lists
Category: Social Security
- 26 Jun 2024
- Posted By WebSiteAdmin
Do you know any reptile farmers? How about any railroad telegraphers? Chances are that you don’t. The Social Security Administration announced it will be removing a number of largely antiquated jobs from their jobs database which is used to determine what other kinds of work a person applying for disability may be able to perform.
The move comes after a popular newspaper ran a story about an electrician who was denied disability benefits because he had not applied for certain jobs on the list. In his case, those particular jobs were nut sorter, dowel inspector, & egg processor.
Martin O’Malley, commissioner of Social Security, said “It makes sense to identify occupations that now exist in very limited numbers in the national economy. By making this update, our decision-makers will no longer cite these jobs when denying a disability application.”
Back in April, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) stated that SSI and SSDI use “outdated criteria to decide whether individuals qualify for benefits”. Fur farmer, SCUBA diver, fire warden & embalmer apprentice are just some of the 114 total occupations being removed from the list. You can see the entire list at the SSA’s website here.
The SSA released this statement further addressing the changes: “While the agency’s disability decision process remains sound, it continually seeks improvements to ensure its disability programs remain current and to ease the burden on customers. We anticipate that, as a result, we will only consider the most relevant occupations when determining if someone applying for disability benefits could perform other types of work.”
Anything that the administration can do to streamline the process and get benefits to people who need them is a good thing.