Maryland Injury and Disability Law : Washington DC Metro Injury & Disability Lawyer & Attorney : Greenberg & Bederman : Accidents, Falls, Medical Malpractice : Maryland, DC, Virginia

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"But no one will hire me"



"Why can’t you work?", I asked the client. "Because no one will hire me", the claimant replied. That may be the case, but that won’t get you disability benefits. It is not one of the factors SSA can take into consideration. In order to get disability benefits you have to demonstrate that you are unable to work.

SSA is allowed to consider 5 factors in determining whether there is any work an individual can do. The factors include age, education, skills, residual functional capacity, and non-exertional impairments. With regard to age, the SSA recognizes three broad age categories: under 50 is young, 50-54 is closely approaching advanced age, and at 55 one becomes of advanced age. Generally, the younger you are ,the harder it is to prove disability. Education may play a large role in cases in which the claimant is over 44 years of age and doesn’t know how to read or write.

Skills are an issue in cases with claimants over 50 years of age. Usually, the more skills one has the more difficult it is to prove disability. Residual functional capacity refers to physical limitations: how long you can sit, stand, walk, etc. Finally, non-exertional impairments refer to problems concentrating, paying attention, persisting at tasks, staying on pace, working within a schedule, etc.

It is important to understand some of the factors SSA is not allowed to consider. SSA cannot consider whether you have ever heard of the job, whether you would or would not like the job, whether it pays what you used to make (if you can do a minimum wage job that satisfies SSA), whether anyone will ever give you an interview, whether anyone will ever hire you, or whether you have transportation to and from a job site.

To learn more about social security disability issues, please click on social security disability law.  To learn more about our social security disability lawyers, please click on social security disability lawyers maryland, and read our firm bios on Dory Sutker or Suja Varghese.