The Social Security Administration has finally revealed the names of the member of its Occupational Information Development Advisory Committee:
- Gunnar B. J. Andersson, M.D., Ph.D.
- Mary Barros-Bailey, Ph.D.
- Robert T. Fraser, Ph.D.
- Shanan Gwaltney Gibson, Ph.D.
- Thomas A. Hardy, J.D.
- Sylvia E. Karman
- Deborah E. Lechner
- Lynnae M. Ruttledge
- David J. Schretlen, Ph.D.
- Nancy G. Shor
- Mark A. Wilson, Ph.D.
- James F. Woods
This Committee is tasked with coming up with an alternative to the Dictionary of Occupational Titles (DOT). Sound really boring? Hundreds of thousands of Social Security disability claimants are now being approved or denied based upon the DOT, even though everyone realizes that the DOT is preposterously out of date. Many of those decisions could go in a different direction depending upon what Social Security does about the DOT.
Judging by the biographical statements of the Committee members, consensus may be hard to come by for this Committee. I do not understand why some of these people are on this Committee. A person who makes her career in developing and marketing Functional Capacity Evaluation (FCE) instruments? A person who tries to measure the disability caused by mental illness? Sounds like people who could easily sidetrack the Committee. I wish that the vast majority of these folks had some background in work evaluation and Social Security disability. My guess is that some of the Committee members are going to find their service to be extremely boring and may never understand the agendas that some others bring to this Committee.
Judging by the biographical statements of the Committee members, consensus may be hard to come by for this Committee. I do not understand why some of these people are on this Committee. A person who makes her career in developing and marketing Functional Capacity Evaluation (FCE) instruments? A person who tries to measure the disability caused by mental illness? Sounds like people who could easily sidetrack the Committee. I wish that the vast majority of these folks had some background in work evaluation and Social Security disability. My guess is that some of the Committee members are going to find their service to be extremely boring and may never understand the agendas that some others bring to this Committee.
2 comments:
Got the same problem you do. Seems to me this is a staff type job, all in-house committee stuff, not SGA or RFE types of stuff. Where is the Office of Labor Statistics? The DOT just lists and describes jobs. It doesn't talk about how these relate to the DOT in its use in making DIB decisions.
Besides, the bad decisions I saw showed me that job descriptions really had nothing to do with the allow/deny result. Often, it's a matter of whether a medical condition or combination of medical conditions meets the regs or the rulings. Not a lot to do with the venerable DOT. The whole notion of not being able to do any job available in the whole domestic labor force is pretty absurd to begin with when you're looking at lower skilled workers. And, older better educated workers are supposed to be able to get jobs for which they are largely considered overqualified. Not.
So, this committee should have people available to it who know something about T2/T16 DIB determinations and other eligibility standards. Then, we can worry about how to quantify the FCE of developmentally disabled or mentally ill people. First, we gotta get through the ordinary DDS process. Not this stuff. Not.
DITTO. I'm sure there is an awful lot of money involved in hiring these committee members. The committee members should consist of current employees with a working knowledge of the issues. I'm sure the agency's explainiation is that they need "fresh eyes" to evaluate the DOTs. Bologna. Hiring/creating a committee of this caliber is just blowing smoke signals - that is costing tax-payers. Surely the committee members will require training. This is taxing on the employees who will assist/train them. Why not use the resources at hand? This would eliminate the extra funds used to pay the salaries AND it would save the government and taxpayers $$$. The funding has probably been appropriated to acquire the committee members - but at what costs?
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