From the testimony of Bea Disman, Acting Chief of Staff, Social Security Administration, to the Social Security Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee:
... To ensure our decisions remain accurate, we are developing a new Occupational Information System (OIS) that will be the primary source of occupational information used in our disability adjudication process. We are working closely with the DOL’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and will have our first complete set of occupational data in 2019 after BLS completes its third year of data collection. We plan to implement the OIS in 2020 with the introduction of a Vocational Information Tool that adjudicators will use to decide claims. Working with us, BLS will immediately begin a new data collection cycle that will allow us to update the OIS at regular five-year intervals.
Parallel to our efforts to develop the OIS, we are working on updating our Medical-Vocational Guidelines, which were issued in 1978. At step five of our sequential evaluation process, we evaluate an individual’s ability to adjust to other work that exists in the national economy. The Medical-Vocational Guidelines are a crosswalk used by adjudicators when considering an individual’s RFC in relation to age, education, work experience, and work that exists in the national economy. We are currently considering potential evidence-based approaches to updating these guidelines to ensure we remain current with changes in medical and vocational practice, technology, and the workforce. We are closely coordinating any potential changes to how we consider vocational efforts with our development of the OIS....Here are some questions I'd like asked of Ms. Disman:
- There have been endless, unexplained delays in developing the OIS. Why?
- Is Social Security allowing BLS to collect the data and see what it shows or is Social Security pressuring BLS to massage the data so that it meets pre-determined goals set by Social Security?
- What would an "evidence-based" approach to updating the Medical-Vocational guidelines look like?
Q: "What would an "evidence-based" approach to updating the Medical-Vocational guidelines look like?"
ReplyDeleteA: All results would point to "Not Disabled"
Maybe they are having trouble gathering "evidence" that supports the conclusions they need to deny more claims.
ReplyDeleteThis will only expand the number of jobs you can do per the VE and create the back to work program Republicans have been pushing lately...as you were thinking...more ways to deny you bennies!
ReplyDeleteI watched the hearing and almost everything she said came across like a lot of bureaucratic nothing. We have plans and initiatives. Its going to take years and years to reduce the backlog. We also need money. Things are getting better with the backlog. The Committee's response. We've heard all this before. You're not getting anymore money. You have to be more efficient without money.
ReplyDeleteYou're very nice but we don't have a lot of faith in the agency. None of this is really new.
@12:14
ReplyDeleteThis could eliminate the need for a VE and will presumably allow the judge to determine the number of jobs based on the limitations input into the OIS. Reps won't have the slightest inkling of what the RFC might be until the decision comes out if that's the case, and hearings will be much shorter. I'm not sure what our poor Massachusetts firm will do with all of their free time once their briefs no longer have any relevance.
Major changes take time and money. I like the conclusion jumping to a conspiracy to deny. Never underestimate the power of just plain poor work to provide a simple answer instead of nefarious boogie persons in the weeds.
ReplyDeleteYou make fun of supporters of the POTUS for believing things are "rigged" and jump to the same conclusions in this.
Give incompetence its due!!