May 9, 2013

"There Must Have Been A Thousand People Just Sitting There Waiting"

     From the Philadelphia Inquirer:
Robin Blount walked up to what used to be a Social Security Administration field office in North Philadelphia this week and was shocked and angry.  ...
A sign inside the gates read: "The Social Security Administration field office previously operating at this location IS NOW CLOSED."
People were advised to visit the Social Security office in Center City at 15th Street and JFK Boulevard, 2 Penn Center, for service.
"I just went down there," Blount, 52, cried out in frustration. "It was so crowded downtown - there must have been a thousand people just sitting there waiting.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

based on their ability to sit and wait, those thousand people have the ability to perform sedentary work activity.

Anonymous said...

@9:17 Troll

Anonymous said...

@ 11:30...not a troll. Just pointing out that many allegations of an inability to do a task are really more like an unwillingness to do a task. The task can be done when needed.

Also, I hope none of those people try and allege that they are unable to be around crowds.

Anonymous said...

At least a thousand...

Anonymous said...

FYI - North Philly is the Black and increasingly Hispanic side of the City of Brotherly Love.

Anonymous said...

And across the river to the East is Camden, NJ, the hopelessly poor and crime ridden side of Philadelphia. Plus a battleship, state aquarium and law school.
In the past few weeks, the well paid union police force of Camden was fired and replace by a lower paid county police force.

Anonymous said...

To @9:17 and @1:11 - I find it telling that you each assumed that EVERYONE there was filing for disability. What about all of those ready for retirement, filing for survivors benefits, or needing a replacement Social Security card ot to do a nasme change due to marriage or divorce? Many people go to an office besides filing for SSDI or SSI. Don't buy-in to the canard that only "takers" need Social Security services - especially since many of those things must be done in person.

Anonymous said...

@ 9:17am: Just cause someone can sit, doesn't mean they can do any sedentary work, if it exists, licking stamps is a con-job, it's not work. One sedentary job is at a phone bank where one calls people and tries to sell people something, either you know how to do that successfully or you're fired and replaced, I tried that once, I got all NOes... Of course sedentary work has to exist, if it doesn't, then what? For a disabled person, the sedentary work might be work, in theory, in actual life it depends on the how the person is and what their skills are like, they may not have the ability, so drop it, as not everyone has a visible disability and some know it alls shoot their mouth off like that, My late Mother called them "know it alls", when they knew not of what they spoke. The Bible says: do not judge, lest thee be judged...

Anonymous said...

And just where does that leave our helpless ALJ's?? Does that mean God will be harsher on them? I do believe that we will all be judged eventually, so what is your point? And no, not everyone is born with skills for sedentary jobs. I threw hay bails as a kid and went to school and acquired skills so I could sit on my butt. And now I am paid to Judge, so how about that??

Anonymous said...

To @9:17 and @1:11. I'm a di beneficiary. In my opinion,a person's ability to engage in a sit and wait or any other short term activity has little or no bearing on long term or perhaps an ability for 10-30 or 40 years of SGA activity.

Just my thoughts.

Anonymous said...

To all of the commenters above, you are missing Mr. Blount's disabling issue (he is 52, not retirement age)! He has no ability to count or even make a reasonable evaluation of what he sees! Imagine that he saw, "a thousand people just sitting there waiting." I wonder how many additional thousands he saw standing? That downtown SSA office must be huge! Or, maybe Mr. Blount wears those Bee prism eye glasses.

Anonymous said...

@ 3:06pm: If you are qualified, then you're qualified, I was speaking about those who aren't qualified to judge.

Anonymous said...

Look, if they want service, then they can wait. As inconvenient as it may be to wait for an hour or two or three (whatever), it would be much worse to be without service period. No matter how many we're in the lobby ( not a thousand I'm sure), I wonder how many people who were not in the lobby were not served? That's right, if all hands are on deck at the windows, no one's desk work is being touched. That's good public service?

Anonymous said...

A previous comment mentioned how some sedentary jobs are cons, that some people just aren't good at them, etc.

The regs don't care about that. They don't care that one doesn't like sales. They don't care that the jobs one is able to do are horrible, boring, etc. They don't care that one's prior felony convictions prevent one from actually getting the jobs one is mentally and physically able to do. They don't care that those jobs don't exist in your hellhole of a town. One does not have to be able to get the job, there do not have to be any actual job openings--one is not disabled if their residual functional capacity allows for the performance of jobs that exist in significant numbers in the regional and national economy. Period (with some exceptions, the GRIDs, etc.).

Think of it this way--a licensed attorney is not magically no longer a licensed attorney because he cannot find attorney work. There is an analogous converse of that notion--one is not disabled if other non-disabiltiy (i.e. not physical, mental, and vocational abilities-related) prevent one from getting work. I'm sorry it's hard out there, but those non-disability factors affect everyone--disabled, able, and those in-between. To use those non-disability factors as a basis for finding someone disabled is nonsensical.

Maybe our disability system should be like other western nations' in that one is disabled if he cannot perform his past work or the work he was trained to do. But that's not what we have, so to speak of these factors that the regs specifically say should not be considered is a waste of everyone's time.

Anonymous said...

10:38 said, "--one is not disabled if their residual functional capacity allows for the performance of jobs that exist in significant numbers in the regional and national economy. Period."

Actually, not factual. The regional economy doesn't even matter. It's only the national economy according to latest training.

Anonymous said...

12:36

The training wasn't particularly nuanced on that point, and neither is your reading of the law.

The lazy way to deal with that issue is that if work exists in large numbers in the national ecomony, you're safe just relying on that because the existence of large numbers nationally--in total-- USUALLY means the job exists in large numbers in each region.

HOWEVER, the regs require that the job exist in significant numbers throughout all regions (remember the example of the clam diggers? tons of jobs, but only in one region).

Please pay closer attention to the law before trying to correct someone else on it ;)

Anonymous said...

I'd like to point out how Agency training, as good a job it does in many ways, is not sufficient.

This national/regional thing is just another example of how SSA dumbs down (in not-quite-correct ways) the law so that the masses (I'm looking at you, "paralegal" writers) at ODAR can spit back out the basic, unnuanced (and all too often incorrect) application of the law in the hundreds of decisions each writer has to crank out every year.

Anonymous said...

Actually, the law sayet, "§ 404.1566. Work which exists in the national economy.
(a) General. We consider that work exists in the national economy when it exists in significant numbers either in the region where you live or in several other regions of the country. It does not matter whether—

(1) Work exists in the immediate area in which you live;

(2) A specific job vacancy exists for you; or

(3) You would be hired if you applied for work.

(b) How we determine the existence of work. Work exists in the national economy when there is a significant number of jobs (in one or more occupations) having requirements which you are able to meet with your physical or mental abilities and vocational qualifications. Isolated jobs that exist only in very limited numbers in relatively few locations outside of the region where you live are not considered “work which exists in the national economy”. We will not deny you disability benefits on the basis of the existence of these kinds of jobs. If work that you can do does not exist in the national economy, we will determine that you are disabled. However, if work that you can do does exist in the national economy, we will determine that you are not disabled." I think the reading holds true, although most Reg's at SSA can be read by several different ways and this can also be confusing to one that doesn't determine what "significant" number of jobs mean..