Social Security has filed a Notice of Proposed Rule-Making (NPRM) that will appear in the Federal Register tomorrow. This NPRM, if adopted, would include for the first time in Social Security's regulations the following definitions:
Preponderance of the evidence means such relevant evidence that as a whole shows that the existence of the fact to be proven is more likely than not.This touches upon something very important, but it still seems so innocous that it is hard to understand why they are bothering. This are standard definitions. Is there something here that I am missing?
Substantial evidence means such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion.
2 comments:
Reasonable minds may differ as to what evidence is substantial. This becomes especially important when there are conflicts in the evidence.
There's no small amount of confusion within the agency over the meanings and proper usage of these terms, so adopting the standard definition in the agency's regs may be useful internally and is probably innocuous.
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