GAO STUDY ON SOCIAL SECURITY DISABILITY

In 2017 the US Government Accountability Office conducted a study concerning how Social Security disability benefits are decided and what factors affect those decisions.

Here is part of that GAO report:

Allowance rates—the rate at which Social Security Administration (SSA) administrative law judges allowed disability benefits to be paid when claimants appealed—varied across judges, even after holding constant certain characteristics of claimants, judges, hearing offices, and other factors that could otherwise explain differences in allowance rates. Specifically, GAO estimated that the allowance rate could vary by as much as 46 percentage points if different judges heard a typical claim (one that was average in all other factors GAO analyzed). SSA officials said that this level of variation is not surprising, given the complexity of appeals and judicial discretion. Nonetheless, the variation declined by 5 percentage points between fiscal years 2007 and 2015 (see figure), a change officials attributed to enhanced quality assurance efforts and training for judges. GAO also identified various factors that were associated with a greater chance that a claimant would be allowed benefits. In addition to characteristics related to disability criteria, such as the claimant's impairment and age, GAO found that claimants who had representatives, such as an attorney...were allowed benefits at a rate nearly 3 times higher than those without representatives. Other factors did not appear related to allowance rates, such as the percentage of backlogged claims in a hearing office.

Claimants about to begin the Social Security disability process should take this report to heart.

The GAO reports mentions 3 things that affect a claimant's chance of approval:

1. Age

2. Type of Impairment

3. Representation

According to the GAO, claimants with representatives were almost 3X as likely to be awarded benefits as those without representatives.

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