Tag: Disability benefits

Public workers may receive reduced Social Security benefits. There’s growing support in Congress to change that

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When Dave Bernstein, 87, started working at the U.S. Postal Service in February 1970, he was making $2.35 an hour.

To supplement his income, he also took on other work. Years later, Bernstein decided in 1992 to take a voluntary retirement.

“We knew there was going to be a reduced pension because of the early out,” said Phyllis Bernstein, Dave’s wife, who is 84.

But what came next was something the couple did not expect.

While Dave was expecting a monthly Social Security check of around $800, it ended up being just about half that amount – around $415 – even though he had earned the required 40 credits to be fully insured by the program. The benefits were adjusted based on rules for workers who earn both pension and Social Security benefits.

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The couple, who reside in Tampa, Florida, have had a different retirement than they envisioned due to the lower income.

Phyllis kept working until she was 82. They have also turned to family for financial support.

Their lifestyle is frugal, with home-cooked meals and cars they kept for 20 years, or “until the wheels were falling off,” the couple jokes.

But their limited resources have made traveling to Australia and New Zealand – Phyllis’ dream – out of reach.

“When he retired, I was working,” Phyllis said. “We just couldn’t do the travel.”

Today, Dave is pushing for the Social Security rules that reduced his benefits to be changed.

His union, the American Postal Workers Union, has endorsed the Social Security Fairness Act, a bill proposed in Congress that would repeal Social Security rules known as the Windfall Elimination Provision, or WEP, and Government Pension Offset, or GPO, that reduce benefits for workers had positions where they did not pay Social Security taxes, also called non-covered earnings.

The legislation has support from other organizations that represent public workers, including teachers, firefighters and police.

The bill has overwhelming bipartisan support in the House of Representatives – 300 co-sponsors – at a time when that chamber has been politically divided. That support recently prompted House lawmakers to send a letter to leaders of the Ways and Means Committee to request a hearing.

The Social Security Fairness Act has also been introduced in the Senate, with support from 49 leaders from both sides of the aisle.

Yet some experts say just getting rid of the rules may not be the most effective way of making the system fairer.

How the WEP, GPO rules work

The WEP applies to how retirement or disability benefits are calculated if a worker earned a retirement or disability pension from an employer who did not withhold Social Security taxes and qualifies for Social Security from work in other jobs where they did pay taxes into the program.

Social Security benefits are calculated using a worker’s average indexed monthly earnings, and then using a formula to calculate a worker’s basic benefit amount. For workers affected by the WEP, part of the replacement rate for the average indexed monthly earnings is brought down to 40% from 90%.

The GPO, meanwhile, reduces benefits for spouses and widows or widowers of recipients of retirement or disability pensions from local, state or federal governments.

It affects hundreds of thousands, if not millions of public employees that paid into Social Security and essentially are being penalized because they also happen to be public servants.

Edward Kelly

general president of the International Association of Fire Fighters

Under the GPO, Social Security benefits are reduced by two-thirds of the government pension. If two-thirds of the government pension is more than the Social Security benefit, the Social Security benefit may be zero.

The impact of the rules is far reaching, according to Edward Kelly, general president of the International Association of Fire Fighters. Many firefighters work in second jobs in the private sector as cab drivers, bar tenders or truck drivers, where they earn credits toward Social Security.

“They steal their money, because they’re also public employees,” said Kelly, who describes his union members as “passionately angry” about the issue.

“It affects hundreds of thousands, if not millions of public employees that paid into Social Security and essentially are being penalized because they also happen to be public servants, whether they are teachers, cops and, obviously, firefighters,” Kelly said.

Why experts say another fix may be better

The WEP and GPO rules were intended to make it so workers who pay Social Security taxes for their entire careers are treated the same as those who do not.

But under those current rules, some beneficiaries receive lower benefits than they would have if they paid into Social Security for all of their careers, while others receive higher benefits, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center.

Yet repealing the WEP and GPO rules would result in Social Security benefits that are “overly generous” for non-covered workers, research has found.

Part of what may create that advantage is that Social Security benefits are progressive, and therefore replace a larger share of income for lower earners. So someone who only has part of their salary history in Social Security may get a higher replacement rate without considering their pension income.

Fully repealing the WEP and GPO rules may also come with higher costs at a time when the program facing a funding shortfall. The change would add an estimated $150 billion to the program’s costs in the next 10 years, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

Another way of handling the disparity may be to create a proportional approach to income replacement. Instead of the WEP, workers’ benefits would be calculated based on all of their earnings and then adjusted to reflect the share of their careers that were in jobs covered by Social Security. A similar approach may be taken with the GPO.

Certain bills on Capitol Hill propose a proportional approach.

However, a proportional formula may not solve all the inequities in the current system, according to Emerson Sprick, senior economic analyst at the Bipartisan Policy Center, which has prompted to think tank to work on refining its proposal.

‘Extremely complex’ to understand

An important advantage to reforming the current formulas would be making it easier for workers to understand and plan for their retirements.

“It is definitely extremely complex, and very hard for folks preparing for retirement or in retirement, to understand what it means for their benefits,” Sprick said.

Social Security statements that provide retirement benefit estimates do not take these rules into account.

Consequently, many workers find out their benefits are adjusted when they are about to retire.

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“The young guys don’t pay attention to it because it’s too far out; they’re not worried about it,” Kelly said of the firefighters.

“It’s not until you’re ready to go out the door that you actually start paying attention to what you’re going to have to live off when you actually retire,” he added.

The reductions to their Social Security benefits can be a shock.

For beneficiaries like the Bernsteins who start out with lower benefits, it can be difficult to catch up, even after a record 8.7% Social Security cost-of-living adjustmentw went into effect this year.

“Gas this summer and in the spring at $4 a gallon ate that money up like it wasn’t even there,” Dave Bernstein said.

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November 12, 2023
Social Security cost-of-living adjustment will be 3.2% in 2024, well below this year’s record-setting increase

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The Social Security Administration has announced a 3.2% cost-of-living adjustment for 2024.

These benefit adjustments are made annually to help benefits keep place with inflation. Recipients will see the increase reflected in their January checks.

The 2024 benefit increase is much lower than record 8.7% cost-of-living adjustment Social Security beneficiaries saw this year, the biggest boost in four decades in response to record high inflation. It is also lower than the 5.9% cost-of-living adjustment for 2022.

The 3.2% increase is in line with an estimate released last month by The Senior Citizens League, a nonpartisan senior group.

This is breaking news. Please check back for updates.

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October 12, 2023
Less than 5% of U.S. housing supply is accessible to older, disabled Americans. These changes may help

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Despite a sizeable elderly and disabled population in the U.S., there is not enough affordable housing to accommodate those individuals.

“For millions of Americans, adequate housing is more of an aspiration than a reality,” said Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., who serves as chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging, at a Thursday hearing.

“In particular, too many older adults and people with disabilities cannot afford accessible housing,” Casey said.

About 26% of the U.S. population — or about 61 million people — have a disability, Casey said. At the same time, 1 in 5 Americans will be older than 65 by 2030.

Accessible homes — which offer specific features or technologies — can help older and disabled individuals continue to live in their own homes or in communities they choose. That may include wider doorways, lower counters and sinks and accessible bathrooms.

Yet less than 5% of the national housing supply is accessible, Casey said. Moreover, less than 1% of housing is available to wheelchairs.

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Leaders on both sides of the political aisle agree the shortage of adequate housing is a problem.

The U.S. is between 3 million and 6 million houses short of what the market needs, noted Sen. Mike Braun, R-Ind., ranking member of the Senate aging committee.

The problem has been complicated by state and federal regulatory burdens, higher infrastructure costs, supply chain constraints, work force shortages and increased materials costs due to inflation, Braun noted.

“Sometimes we’re at odds in terms of what we should do, but there’s always practical legislation in the middle, and I’d hope that we can have those conversations that get us there,” Braun said.

Suggestions for improvements emerged during Thursday’s hearing.

Develop affordable, accessible housing

For Dominique Howell, a disability housing advocate based in Philadelphia, finding an adequate place to call home that can accommodate her disability has been a struggle, she testified at Thursday’s hearing.

Five years ago, Howell said, she was “wrongfully evicted” from her home, along with her daughter, who was 3 years old at the time, and her grandmother.

Howell was initially prohibited from entering a shelter, due to the home- and community-based services she receives. After finding legal representation, she was able to enter the shelter, though she slept in her power wheelchair for a year.

Today, Howell and her daughter have found a home. However, it still has accessibility challenges, she said. When the elevator breaks, she and other residents are sometimes forced to spend weeks in their homes.

“Housing is a human right and unfortunately for too many Americans, especially people with disabilities, are not being equally granted the right of housing they can afford that is accessible,” Howell said.

To address the situation, Pennsylvania and other states should “develop affordable accessible housing to match the needs of residents,” she said.

Retrofitting older homes to update them and improve accessibility may be one solution, said Jenny Schuetz, a senior fellow at Brookings Metro. However, updating millions of homes is an “enormous task” that would require both private and public capital, she said.

Making homes more affordable for elderly and disabled populations is crucial, said Allie Cannington, senior manager of advocacy at The Kelsey, a disability-forward housing developer.

“For people with disabilities who rely on Supplemental Security Income and other forms of federal assistance, there is no U.S. housing market where rent is affordable,” Cannington said, an issue that affects more than 4.8 million people with disabilities.

Encourage new housing construction

The U.S. has not built enough housing since the Great Recession to keep up with job and population growth, noted Schuetz. To fill the gap, the U.S. needs about 3.8 million additional homes nationally, according to estimates, she said.

Local markets are also feeling the effects. In Indiana, for example, 18,000 to 22,000 new houses per year are needed in order to meet average demand, according to Rick Wajda, chief executive of the Indiana Builders Association. Yet the state only reached those levels of production in 2020 for the first time since 2007, he said.

To reverse the “underbuilding” trend that has been prevalent since the Great Recession, there should be financial incentives for local governments to revise zoning to allow for more kinds of structures, Schuetz said.

Regulations may be relaxed to shorten delays that often lead to increased building costs, according to Wajda. Permit, hookup or impact fees, as well as development and construction standards, may get in the way of development, he said.

Restrictive building codes may also add thousands of dollars to a house’s cost, thereby adding thousands of dollars to the cost of a house, Wajda said.

“All regulations should be examined for their impact on housing affordability,” he said.

To address the shortage of accessible and affordable housing for vulnerable populations, Casey has proposed a bill that would require a percentage of homes built through the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Program to meet accessibility standards.

It remains to be seen whether the proposal will receive the support needed to become law.

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July 21, 2023
As Republican contenders start to line up for the White House in 2024, Social Security may be key issue

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Last November’s midterm elections were expected to bring a so-called “red wave” of wins for Republican candidates. But ultimately, voters gave Democrats an edge in some of the most competitive congressional districts.

One deciding factor was candidates’ messages around Social Security and Medicare, which helped sway voters, particularly those ages 50 and up, according to an analysis from AARP following the Nov. 8 election.

Now, as the 2024 presidential election approaches, and GOP hopefuls line up for their party’s nomination, they face new pressure to decide where they stand, particularly with Social Security.

Former President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis — who thus far are in the lead in the Republican polls — have so far pledged not to touch the program.

“Under no circumstances should Republicans vote to cut a single penny from Medicare or Social Security to help pay for Joe Biden’s reckless spending spree,” Trump said in January.

In March, DeSantis told Fox News, “We’re not going to mess with Social Security as Republicans.”

Their position matches that of President Joe Biden, who during the State of the Union prompted both sides of the aisle to agree the program is “off the books.”

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While that stance is popular with the public, some experts say it is ill-advised.

“It’s fundamentally irresponsible to say we’re not going to touch it when everybody who’s ever looked at the finances of the program recognizes that it’s going bankrupt,” said Whit Ayres, president of North Star Opinion Research, a center-right political polling operation.

The situation presents an opportunity for a hero to emerge, one who can put the program on sound financial footing, Ayres said.

One longshot Republican hopeful — former Cranston, Rhode Island, mayor Steve Laffey — plans to enter the race with his own bold plan to reconstruct Social Security as the first priority on his agenda.

“Our biggest problem is this: We as Americans simply don’t directly confront our problems,” Laffey said.

Social Security is the “ultimate example of that,” he said.

Changes needed ‘sooner rather than later’

A crucial inflection point, particularly for Social Security, is coming, according to the program’s trustees.

Social Security’s combined funds will only be able to pay full benefits until 2034. At that point, just 80% of benefits will be payable if nothing is done sooner.

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle would need to agree on fixes for the program. These could include benefit cuts, such as raising the retirement age, tax increases or a combination of both.

But with Democrats vowing to protect benefits and Republicans swearing off tax increases, that has thus far left little room for compromise.

As Washington leaders recently worked out a deal to raise the nation’s debt ceiling for two years, the cost of Social Security and Medicare came under scrutiny.

Both Social Security and Medicare fall under the category of mandatory spending, which altogether represents more than two-thirds of the nation’s budget, according to the Tax Foundation.

Consequently, it is impossible to address the nation’s spending without addressing those programs, according to Tax Foundation economist Alex Durante.

“The longer we push this out, it becomes more difficult to try to protect everyone that receives the benefits,” Durante said. “It’s important that we tackle this sooner rather than later.”

Proposal for ‘modern version’ of Social Security

The Social Security plan Laffey would implement throws out the traditional approaches of tax increases or benefit cuts.

Instead, he wants to gradually phase out the FICA tax completely. Currently, workers and employers each pay 6.2% on up to $160,200 in wages toward Social Security.

That would be replaced by new Personal Security System accounts, to which workers would contribute 10% of their pay. Those balances would be invested in a weighted index of global stocks, bonds and other securities.

The plan comes from Laurence Kotlikoff, a Boston University economics professor who has devoted much of his career to helping people get the most from Social Security and demystifying the program’s many rules.

Kotlikoff himself ran for president in 2012 and 2016 as a third-party candidate. In subsequent election cycles, he has urged Laffey to run.

The two met when Laffey was working on “Fixing America,” a 2012 documentary about Americans’ perspectives on fixing the country’s problems post-financial crisis. Laffey wrote and co-produced the documentary, for which he interviewed Kotlikoff.

Laffey, a former Morgan Keegan executive, has mostly been out of politics after serving two terms as mayor of Cranston, Rhode Island.

He ran for a U.S. Senate seat in Rhode Island in 2006 and then in 2014 pursued the Republican nomination for a U.S. House seat representing Colorado, where he now lives. He was unsuccessful in both races.

Republican 2024 presidential hopeful Steve Laffey arrives for an interview at a local TV station in Cranston, Rhode Island, on March 17, 2023.

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Laffey launched a campaign for mayor at a time when Cranston had the lowest bond rating in America, he said. The big accomplishment he boasts as Cranston mayor is bringing the city’s bond rating up. The city’s S&P rating climbed to an A- in 2006 from a B in 2002, according to a spokesman for Laffey.

The Social Security plan would be a fully funded system, where you get your money back in the form of an inflation-indexed annuity, according to Kotlikoff.

“It’s a modern version of Social Security,” Kotlikoff said.

The goal would be to give beneficiaries a bigger return on the money than they get now.

It also aims to address the program’s current inequities. The government would make matching contributions on behalf of lower earners, the disabled and unemployed. Spouses would share their contributions to the program equally.

The investment strategies would be computerized and custodied by the federal government, not by Wall Street. Everyone would get the same rate of return, Kotlikoff noted.

The expectation is that over a 40-year time horizon the accounts would be able to make up for down years and ultimately provide workers with more money than today’s Social Security program.

The hope is a worker who is 20 years old in 2025 may eventually stand to get $10,000 per month, rather than $2,000, which would be a “lot better,” Laffey said.

The plan coincides with Laffey’s plans to overhaul government spending, such as changing the Federal Reserve’s inflation target to zero, rather than the current goal of 2%, in order to force Congress to work within its budget.

‘Both sides are going to have to give’

Because any changes to Social Security involve strict emotions, the big question is whether lawmakers and Americans would be ready to embrace a new direction for the program.

The idea of rethinking the way Social Security funds are invested has come up before.

While in office, President George W. Bush had proposed letting Americans save part of their Social Security taxes in personal retirement accounts, referred to as “partial privatization.”

Andrew Biggs, who worked in the White House on Social Security reform at the time and who is now a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, remembers the proposal did not come close to succeeding, even as Social Security still had surpluses and Republicans controlled both houses of Congress.

Consequently, privatization — where personal accounts are funded out of part of the existing payroll tax — would be a long shot, he said.

“If Bush couldn’t do it then, despite a great effort, that’s not happening now,” Biggs said.

But personal accounts funded on top of the existing Social Security program, such as ensuring everyone signs up for a retirement plan at work, could be “more possible,” he said.

Another challenge may be getting Americans to embrace the idea.

The only people who like personalized accounts are affluent, college-educated white men, said Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster and president at Lake Research Partners, who has conducted focus groups with married couples on the subject.

Women of all ages, who are very worried about the future of the program for their own economic security, are less likely to embrace the idea, she said.

Biden and Trump campaign signs are displayed as voters line up to cast their ballots during early voting at the Alafaya Branch Library in Orlando, Florida, Oct. 30, 2020.

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For candidates, taking such a position can also jeopardize their primary and general election viability, Lake said.

Yet Ayres, of North Star Opinion Research, sees an opportunity for reforms much like President Ronald Reagan helped usher in, which put Social Security on sound financial footing for half a century, he said.

That likely won’t come from an “unworkable” overhaul of the program, Ayres said, but instead more marginal changes, such as raising the retirement age by several months and increasing the cap on Social Security earnings.

Like Reagan’s efforts, it would also require bipartisan commissions, he said.

As with the newly inked debt ceiling deal, “both sides are going to have to give a little bit,” Ayres said.

“Just putting your head in the sand and waiting for it to go bankrupt is a fundamentally irresponsible position,” he said.

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June 7, 2023
Social Security payments set for big increase. What to know.

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NEW YORK — Tens of millions of older Americans are about to get what may be the biggest raise of their lifetimes.

On Thursday, the U.S. government is set to announce how big a percentage increase Social Security beneficiaries will see in monthly payments this upcoming year. It’s virtually certain to be the largest in four decades. It’s all part of an annual ritual where Washington adjusts Social Security benefits to keep up with inflation, or at least with one narrow measure of it.

Plenty of controversy accompanies the move, known as a cost-of-living adjustment or COLA. Critics say the data the government uses to set the increase doesn’t reflect what older Americans are actually spending, and thus the inflation they’re actually feeling. The increase is also one-size-fits-all, which means beneficiaries get the same raise regardless of where they live or how big a nest egg they may have.

Here’s a look at what’s happening:

WHAT’S THE BIG DEAL?

The U.S. government is about to announce an increase to how much the more than 65 million Social Security beneficiaries will get every month. Some estimates say the boost may be as big as 9%.

WHAT DO BENEFICIARIES HAVE TO DO TO GET IT?

Nothing.

WILL THIS BE THE BIGGEST INCREASE EVER?

No, but it’s likely the heftiest in 40 years, which is longer than the vast majority of Social Security beneficiaries have been getting payments. In 1981, the increase was 11.2%.

WHEN WILL THE BIGGER PAYMENTS BEGIN?

January. They’re also permanent, and they compound. That means the following year’s percentage increase, whatever it ends up being, will be on top of the new, larger payment beneficiaries get after this most recent raise.

HOW BIG WAS THIS PAST YEAR’S INCREASE?

5.9%, which itself was the biggest in nearly four decades.

WHAT’S THE TYPICAL INCREASE?

Since 2000, it’s averaged 2.3% as inflation remained remarkably tame through all kinds of economic swings. During some of the toughest years in that stretch, the bigger worry for the economy was actually that inflation was running too low.

Since the 2008 financial crisis, the U.S. government has announced zero increases to Social Security benefits three times because inflation was so weak.

SO THE INCREASE IS TO MAKE UP FOR INFLATION?

That’s the intent. As Americans have become painfully aware over the past year, each $1 doesn’t go as far at the grocery store as it used to.

HAS SOCIAL SECURITY ALWAYS GIVEN SUCH INCREASES?

No. The first American to get a monthly retirement check from Social Security, Ida May Fuller from Ludlow, Vermont, got the same $22.54 monthly benefit for 10 years.

Automatic annual cost-of-living adjustments didn’t begin for Social Security until 1975, after a law passed in 1972 requiring them.

HOW IS THE SIZE OF THE INCREASE SET?

It’s tied to a measure of inflation called the CPI-W index, which tracks what kinds of prices are being paid by urban wage earners and clerical workers.

More specifically, the increase is based on how much the CPI-W increases from the summer of one year to the next.

IS THAT THE INFLATION MEASURE EVERYONE FOLLOWS?

No. People generally pay more attention to a much broader measure of inflation, the CPI-U index, which covers all urban consumers. That covers 93% of the total U.S. population.

The CPI-W, meanwhile, covers only about 29% of the U.S. population. It has been around longer than the CPI-U, which the government began compiling only after the legislation that required Social Security’s annual increases be linked to inflation.

IS THAT WEIRD?

Yes, and some critics have argued for years that Social Security should change to a different measure, one that’s pegged to older people in particular.

Another experimental index, called CPI-E, is supposed to offer a better reflection of how Americans aged 62 and above spend their money. It has historically shown higher rates of inflation for older Americans than the CPI-U or CPI-W, but it has not taken hold. Neither have other measures compiled by organizations outside the government that hope to show how inflation affects older Americans specifically.

Recently, the CPI-E has shown a bit milder inflation than CPI-W or CPI-U.

WHY NOT USE ONE OF THOSE OTHER INDEXES?

To calculate the CPI-E, the government pulls from the same survey data used to measure the broad CPI-U. But there are relatively few older households in that data set, meaning it may not be the most accurate.

All indexes give just a rough approximation of what inflation really is. But the more pressing challenge may be that if the government switched to a different index, one that showed higher inflation for older Americans, Social Security would have to pay out higher benefits.

That in turn would mean a faster drain on Social Security’s trust fund, which looks to run empty in a little more than a decade at its current pace.

HOW IS THE SIZE SET FOR SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS?

Through a complicated formula that takes into account several factors, including how much a worker made in their 35 highest-earning years. Generally, those who made more money and those who wait longer to start getting Social Security get larger benefits, up to a point.

This year, the maximum allowed benefit for someone who retired at full retirement age is $3,345 monthly.

WILL RICH PEOPLE GET THE SAME BOOST IN SOCIAL SECURITY?

Yes. Everyone gets the same percentage increase, whether they have millions of dollars in retirement savings or are just scraping by.

IF THE INCREASE IS BASED ON INFLATION IN URBAN AREAS, WILL PEOPLE IN RURAL AREAS GET THE SAME BOOST?

Yes.

“The COLA doesn’t take into account where you live or your actual spending patterns,” said William Arnone, CEO of the National Academy of Social Insurance. “For some people, it’s an overstatement of cost of living for, say, small towns in the Midwest versus urban areas like New York, D.C. or Chicago. With many older people choosing to live in suburban areas or rural areas, some will benefit more” than others from the same-sized increase.

DO BIGGER PAYOUTS NOW MEAN SMALLER PAYOUTS IN THE FUTURE?

The expected increase is great news for every beneficiary and for the businesses around them that could see more in sales. But it also means the Social Security system will pay out more money sooner, which can add more strain on its trust fund.

One year of big increases driven by inflation won’t drain the system by itself, but it’s already long been heading toward an unsustainable future. The latest annual trustees report for Social Security said its trust funds that pay out retirement and survivors and disability benefits will be able to pay scheduled benefits on a timely basis until 2035. After that, incoming cash from taxes will be enough to pay 80% of scheduled benefits.

WILL THIS MAKE INFLATION WORSE?

It will put more cash in the hands of people who mostly really need it, and they’re very likely to use it. That will feed more fuel into the economy, which could keep upward pressure on inflation.

Social Security’s boost, though, will have a smaller impact on the economy than past stimulus packages provided by Washington, snarls in supply chains caused by worldwide shutdowns of businesses or other factors that economists say are behind the worst inflation in decades.

SO EVERYTHING’S GOING TERRIBLY?

The risk of a recession seems to grow by the day, but many economists expect inflation to come down as interest-rate hikes take effect and supply chains continue to improve.

Economists at Deutsche Bank, for example, expect inflation to ease from 8.2% this past August to 7.2% in the last three months of this year. In 2023, they see it dropping to 3.9% in the second half of the year.

This is key for many Social Security beneficiaries. That would mean the COLA they receive this upcoming year would be bigger than the inflation they’re feeling at the moment. That would help make up for this past year, where actual inflation far outstripped the cost-of-living increase they got in January 2022.

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October 12, 2022
Disability Application Help Launches a New Website to Offer a Free Social Security Disability Online Case Evaluation

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Press Release
–

updated: Feb 28, 2020

ROCHESTER, N.Y., February 28, 2020 (Newswire.com)
–
Disability Application Help provides a free, nationwide disability benefits evaluation service. A new website has been launched that makes it easier for people to request a free case evaluation. The free service allows disabled people to quickly find out if they may qualify for social security disability benefits. Some people may find that after working many years on the job that their body can’t do the work that it once did. An example of a person that may qualify for benefits would be a person who was a roofer for many years and now finds that their knees are in very bad shape. If the person can’t find another job because they did only roofing during their career, they may qualify for social security disability benefits.

It’s easy for people to request a free case evaluation. A person enters their contact information online and answers a few simple questions. A disability advocate or attorney will review the information and then call the disabled person to ask any additional questions and give the results of the disability benefits evaluation.

Disability Application Help has reliably been providing free social security disability case evaluations since August 2011. Disability Application Help has its headquarters in Rochester, New York.

Disability Application Help welcomes links from other websites to promote the free disability case evaluation service. Visit Disability Application Help at https://www.disabilityapplicationhelp.org.

Media Contact:
Connie Williams
Phone: (877) 501-3684
Email: postmaster@disabilityapplicationhelp.org

Source: Disability Application Help

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February 28, 2020