I had posted earlier that representing Social Security disability claimants doesn't pay as well as some other fields of practice that are, at least, a little similar, workers compensation and personal injury. I've found these publicly available average yearly salary numbers from ZipRecruiter:
- Social Security attorney: $56,763
- Personal injury attorney: $82,049
- Attorney generally: $77,331
These numbers seem about right to me. I would caution that these appear to me to be an average of salaries for jobs advertised on ZipRecruiter. Those would mostly be a mix of entry level jobs and jobs for attorneys with a modest amount of experience. Highly experienced attorneys don't move around all that much and when they do websites like ZipRecruiter are seldom involved. I don't know why but I couldn't find an average salary number for workers compensation claimants' attorney, which would be the closest analogue to Social Security.
If we want competent attorneys representing Social Security claimants, we're going to have to do something about this salary imbalance and the only way to do that is by allowing Social Security attorneys to charge more. The easiest way of doing that is by increasing the fee cap but more may be required.
You're not protecting claimants by holding down the fees they're allowed to pay their attorney. At best, you're holding down the quality of attorney available to them but you may be making it harder for them to find any attorney.
I have heard Social Security employees bemoan the increasing number of unrepresented claimants who fail to appear for scheduled hearings. Get a clue, people. The biggest reason they don't show up is that they've become discouraged because they couldn't find an attorney to represent them. In an environment in which it's hard to make a living as a Social Security attorney, the first thing you do is to try harder to avoid cases you think you're unlikely to win but making this sort of decision isn't easy. All of us in this field of practice place a heavy emphasis on the claimant's age when making these decisions which means that if you're young it may be hard to find a Social Security attorney. I fear we turn away too many younger claimants who actually have good cases. To do something about the difficulties that younger people have finding a Social Security attorney, you have to change the risk-reward ratio that attorneys face. The risk isn't likely to change so you have to increase the reward. Is this hard to understand?
19 comments:
If the brass has truly been leaning on the ALJ corp to lower approval percentages that is a problem also. A very hostile enviroment has been created for everybody associated or supposedly benefitting from this program-claimants, workers, and representatives. That really needs to change.
I represent claimants and recently signed NOSSCR's petition to Commissioner Saul to raise the fee cap. I believe increasing the cap from $6000 would be the simplest remedy, but I wonder if changing the 25% fee rate should be considered? I understand the fee has been 25% of past-due benefits for quite some time, subject to a maximum that has been sporadically raised. Personal injury lawyers typically charge a 1/3 (33.3%) fee, so I don't think increasing from 25% is out of the question.
I always find these posts some of the most insightful on the blog. Truly. I love to see the amounts reps think they should be paid for the work and what others think they should be paid.
It always reminds me of the arguments you see surrounding $15/hr Minimum Wage. I personally believe in a variation of the old Minmax Theory and Perceived Advantage. Although Minimax originally dealt with on a calorie basis, it seems it can be updated to a monetary system. Minimum outlay for Maximum gain. Everyone wants to get the most for what they do. Hunter/Gatherer, Representative, Burger Flipper all the same.
Everyone makes a decision, based on a Perceived Advantage they see in the outcome. From where you sit in a waiting room or theatre, who you associate with, where you live, what you do for a living, all are chosen on the basis of a Perceived Advantage. Even in a homeless or low income situation.
The interesting thing is the where these two theories of human activity meet. The individual. I look forward to seeing the responses and justifications on both sides.
Why should the fee cap be raised when there gobs of NARs thrilled by the $6,000, firms paying poorly trained cookie cutter NARs a pittance to do 30, 40 in person hearings a month, or firms paying $300 or less for an attorney to appear at a hearing. In many cases the claimant is receiving far less than $6,000 worth. I really dislike writing this awful truth.
@9:37
I expect the imposition of a fee cap dissuades people from entering the field on a purely (or even average) profit-driven motive. If it doesn't, the years it takes SSA to actually pay your fees even after an award does.
As to minmax, it ignores malpractice and it ignores the financial risk involved in trying to cut corners on a social security claim. In regard to perceived advantage, sortof? I think the average attorney-rep falls into two categories. The majority appear to stay in the field due to the emotional benefit of seeing a claimant win based on your efforts. It's an advantage of a kind, just not a financial advantage. The smaller group are those who are inexperienced, unaware of the time scale/risk involved, and are just trying it out.
@10:56
Fair. Not sure how to fix that. Maybe some sort of certification process, and requiring a petition if representation began post-recon. Then again, those are going to discourage representation.
Actually it seems to boil down to this is what you value your own work at. If you valued it higher you would do something else. You can try the White Knight defense to make yourself feel good about the decision, but the absolute bottom line is you are okay with what they are paying or you would be doing something else.
@11:23 You obviously know nothing about how things work if you think a fee petition post-recon would help anything. Fee petitions have two truths: 1) the bad ALJs get to slash fees to minimal levels with no real recourse for the rep, 2) ALJs sit on them for long periods of time out of laziness or, again, punish reps just because they can.
@12:00
Not really. In the past, it was rare to hit the fee cap, meaning fees naturally were increasing over time. Akin to a raise. With administrative delay, along with PIA increasing over time, now the cap is practically hit in every case which goes to a hearing. So the objections are to the current circumstances.
@12:51
11:23 here. I'm certainly familiar with fee petitions as I've done hundreds of them and I agree with both your points.
I think though that we may have different goals. I think a rep who is paid $300 to show up to the hearing, did nothing to ensure the record was developed, and does nothing at the hearing, should get nothing even in the event the ALJ were to award benefits. Luck should not be rewarded, effort should.
@1:23 you are still doing it knowing what you are getting paid. So you accept the value of your work or you would be doing something else.
@1:31
1:23 here. How so? When you sign up a claimant at initial, you know the claim could be up to $6,000 or 25%. That could be as little as $0, or as much as 25% of an indeterminate amount of past-due benefits. I certainly don't accept a value of any kind. I also don't "accept" the current fee agreement limit, which is why I support increasing it.
I had no idea that attorneys who represented SSA claimants are only making $56,000.00 per year.
I'm glad I didn't take the LSAT and go to law school, as I once considered for a career path Going through the difficulty of law school, bar exam, and a stressful legal career, for $56k?
I think the $6000 fee cap should have been raised years ago. When the fee agreement cap was introduced, SSA was raising it every few years and I expected that to continue. I'm not sure what happened to stop the increases.
Something needs to be done. I have no empirical evidence to support my theory, but I believe that attorneys are leaving the Social Security practice for just this reason. Soon, there will be very few of us. It does not help that DO employees tell claimants that they do not have to have an attorney to help them, or that all attorneys do is bungle things up. During the pandemic, I have been playing "shortstop" and trying to do Social Security's job as well as my own. It is maddening.
1:23 An attorney paid a $300 per diem may be worth nothing but the the firm that pad that fee will get the full fee which may even exceed $6,000.
The salary for an entry level or minimal experience is not a true reflection of the fees generated by that person for the employer. When NRAs or per diem hearing reps are involved the profit margin for the firm is astounding.
I have two points/ questions. Honestly everyone, is that salary estimate really in line with what you are making. I’d love to hear real responses on that, because it’s in line with some of the non-profit work, but seems to be more stressful.
Secondly, I think we can all agree that the fee schedule should accurately represent the work, billable hours, fees for extra records, exams etc. I don’t think it’s fair for someone to sign onto a hearing a week before the date and collect 6,000 when you clearly didn’t do 6,000 worth of work. On the flip side, if you have been working a case through recon and the appeal and go to extraordinary lengths to get it won, SSA should pay for the difference between the $6,000 cap and the actual fees. I think RO, non-atty staff should make that decision so the ALJ and OHO staff can’t obligatorily deny these requests out of spite on remand or any other reason.
I’m not opposed to the cap being raised whether dollar amount or percentage up to 33% or something because this is America and people can contract for whatever they want generally, but I wonder if increasing the fee would have a negative impact on the number of claimants who seek representation. Maybe, maybe not.
But it would be nice if the reps asking for the increase would stop with the sanctimonious complaints about their destitute clients. Certainly claimants who are facing eviction or foreclosure or are already homeless are a huge issue, but taking more of their home-sustaining or life-sustaining back pay isn’t a great solution.
8:49 I am for all intents and purposes "retired" due to a disability. I only take cases where a desperate claimant was dropped by a firm telling them the case lacks merits after the hearing is scheduled, often 2 weeks or less or less before the hearing. I don't concern myself with the potential fee amount but without competent representation they previously did not have they were dead in the water. Why is my work not worth whatever the fee turns out to be? The were going to get $0.00. The value isn't always in the mechanic's hours per the ASA manual (aka billable hours) Of course it sounds and is presumptuous but burgers from McDonald's aren't what everyone offers for service.
My experience is not that ALJs deny remand cases out of spite. FO staff are usually the spiteful vermin that criticize representatives and OHO staff, including ALJs. Where do you get that notion?
SSA should change the rule that says they won't issue direct payment to an attorney who quits or is discharged by the client, before a favorable decision. Such an attorney can still charge a fee but must collect it directly from the client. Good luck with collecting that fee.
An attorney can spend years on a case then the client fires him or her right before the ALJ hearing, that attorney should still be eligible for direct payment!
Always tell my attorneys when hired - Social Security disability is probably not the area of law to practice if you want a lot of money.
That being said. The fee probably is not close to fair market value.
I have done mainly SSD/SSI law since the mid 2000s.But have also done workers comp and personal injury.
In California, workers comp cases only allow 15 percent of back due benes. However, you can make money prior to winning the case with depo fees. Personal injury typically allows 33 percent or more.
I will say the benefit is actually SSD/SSI is more professional. Workers comp cases are a mess. PI cases also sometimes. SSD/SSI cases are more straightforward. You are either disabled or not no percentage of disability.
I would say the $6000 cap is antiquated and should go away. Just get 25 percent. Makes it easy.
@10:13 I was referring to my proposal that allows attorneys to seek over the 6,000 cap when the work merits it, but rather than taking the money out of the pockets of the disabled, making that money come from SSA and I was saying to take this fee petition process out of OHO hands and let it be processed in the RO. The cap isn’t a punitive measure on representation but also a protection for the claimant. If people want to increase the fee that’s great but make SSA pay for it. If the agency had made the right decision on intel’s or recon or even first hearing, then the claimants would be better off. Make the fee punitive to the agency for rushing through cases.
And since you were able to respond to my post, at least to the second part, would you mind answering the first? Honestly what were your earnings like with SSA clients before you retired. I find it hard to believe atty pay is lower than non-profit or third party reps.
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