From How Does the Social Security Claiming Process Vary by Race?, a report by the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College:
From How Does the Social Security Claiming Process Vary by Race?, a report by the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College:
11 comments:
Be interesting to know the denial percentage by race.
Exactly.
GAO, Racial Difference in Disability Decisions Warrants Further Investigation (GAO/HRD-92-56, April 21, 1992).
https%3A%2F%2Fwww.gao.gov%2Fassets%2Fhrd-92-56.pdf
Perhaps it's time for further investigation.
For SSI applicants aged 18 to 24, however, the racial difference in initial decisions was almost twice that of any other age group. The racial difference was largely unexplained by differences in severity and type of impairment or in demographic characteristics.
Moreover, at the ALJ appeals level, racial difference in allowance rates was larger than at the other levels and did not appear to be related to severity or type of impairment, age or other demographic characteristics, appeal rate, or attorney representation.
what exactly the the striped bars mean? There is no explanation.
As a disability specialist, I can assure you that is never even considered in my decisions whatsoever. Definitely doesn't need to be made into a thing.
Invert the numbers on the first chart, then cut them down by about 30%, and you’re probably not far off.
The last majority of my office's T2 claims are filed online. We never even see the claimants much of the time until a decision is made.
When documents are needed, the poorer claimants have more difficulty producing them but that's been the case for the 30 years I've worked at SSA. That would impact minorities more but much of the time we don't even need a birth certificate.
5:34, the solid bars show statistically significant differences from White respondents, and the striped bars show non-significant differences.
The study is limited to people applying for Social Security retirement benefits - not disability ones. I'm sure the numbers would be much different.
A variance in allowance rates etc does not necessarily mean anyone at SSA is discriminating based on race. And my guess is that the posters above almost certainly are not. But there is a variance that is not well-explained. As but one example - many lower-income/minority claimants do not have the same access to health care as wealthier white claimants, so lower-income/minority claimants have greater difficulty proving disability.
I'll just note that they are relying on survey data because SSA is not tracking this demographic data in a rigorous way. And for good reason: for one, I think there would be some very interesting trends in ALJ decision making by claimant race. And they do not want to shine a light on that.
Since you're measuring how much and when people contact the agency, you could simply be measuring Trust. As in if you don't trust the system, you're more likely to try to verify.
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