The article uses the example of a child who suffers from ADHD, which I have found to be an impairment that is incredibly difficult to win benefits on.  Most children disability cases I that I see awarded benefits are those that deal with significant mental incapacity, low IQ and developmental delay.  I also see benefits awarded on severe endocrine disorders and blood disorders such as sickle cell anemia.  These children require special care and expense. Even the maximum award of $674 doesn’t go very far in helping to care for these children.

This is a witch hunt that disgusts me.  Indigent disabled children will suffer at the hands of political pandering.

According to Michael J Astrue, Commissioner of Social Security,  “Congress provided our agency with nearly $1 billion less than the President requested for our budget this fiscal year, which makes it impossible for us to provide the amount of overtime needed to handle service to the public as we have in the past.”

I think it is unlikely that we will get to the point of stopping payment of benefits, but isn’t it disgusting how these politicians gamble with the livelihood of our senior and disabled citizens?

“What we found in a nutshell is that having Medicaid makes a big difference in people’s lives,” said Amy Finkelstein, another MIT economist and one of the study’s principal investigators.

Read the story from NPR here.

The perpetrator,  Douglas David McCallum, stated, “It was a fit of rage caused by years of being screwed over by the government.”

This is really a very sad situation.   Though I know many of you can feel his frustration, I certainly hope none of my readers would resort to such extremes.

We will determine you are not disabled if your residual functional capacity and vocational abilities make it possible for you to do work that exists in the national economy but you remain unemployed because of…your inability to get work…lack of work in your local area…the hiring practices of employers…technological changes in the industry in which you have worked…cyclical economic conditions…no job openings for you…or…you would not actually be hired to do work you could otherwise do.

Therefore, the burden on a claimant is to prove more than the fact that is unlikely that an employer will hire him or her.  Rather, they must prove that they are actually incapable of performing work that exists in significant numbers in the national economy.

Cutting U.S. Social Security benefits for seniors and the disabled may cause steeper spending declines in House districts controlled by Republicans, hurting local businesses, a Bloomberg Government study found.

Republicans are likely to represent districts with more residents collecting Social Security checks for retirees or benefits for the disabled, compared with Democrats, according to the study. Curtailing the federal aid would give recipients less spending money, said Jason Arvelo, the Bloomberg Government labor analyst who wrote the report released today.

While more people are applying, Social Security has made significant progress in processing claims in the past year or two. However, it is currently taking hearing offices, on average, 367 days to process and hear cases.

I encourage you to read the article as well as the disturbing comments.  I can’t tell you how angry ignorant comments about disability claimants, such as those posted to the USA Today article, make me.  It is these type of people who cause disabled individuals to come into my office wrought with guilt and apologizing for applying for benefits that they paid for over their working career.  I can’t help but wonder how these commentators’ tune would change if they were struck with the tragedy of a disabling disease or injury.

While I agree that there are likely some minimal abuses of the system, a Congressional investigation such as this will only have a negative impact on those who really need the program.