Posted on 01/02/2011 11:36:02 PM PST by Angelus
The statement "One in 19 Americans today get SSDI or SSI. That's one in 19 Americans (who) are disabled." Sen. Tom Coburn, Dec. 1, 2010, in a meeting of the Simpson-Bowles deficit commission.
At a meeting of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform — the Simpson-Bowles commission tasked with finding a solution to deficits — one panel member, Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., cited disability payments as an example of government spending "out of control."
1 in 20 Americans now collect disability payments and that number will continue to rise because Congress will not reform a welfare program in which "disability" can mean just about anything.
BUMP!
I really hope this has legs and Coburn can get some reforms here. This SS is a total welfare program full of all types of cheats.
Seriously!! I hope this issue gets legs!!!! Been people gaming the system since the 70s!
This is a great subject. Do you all know that drug addicts and so called alcoholics get disability if they are in a rehab?
To top that off, I know somebody who went as far as having some kind of box put in her neck to stop her from having epileptic seizures that she has never had to guarantee that she stays on disability; life is so good on disability, that she had personalized license plates put on her car with the name of the thing that she had put in her neck.
Let's take a highly functional or incomplete quadriplegic for example. Able to somewhat use their hands but unable to do things like empty a urinary drainage bag etc. Next is the problem about being up in a wheelchair for the work day. One pressure sore can mean weeks if not months in bed. This is but a few examples. There are also non visable disabilities like CHF and other disorders s well. Just because a person can walk does not mean they can function in a work place at gainfull employment.
Despite what the senator says S.S. disability is in fact not that easy to obtain. The first filing is denied almost automatically even with ample proof from many doctors including the SS agencies contracted examiners. The first appeal with overwhelming proof might get you on disability. Odds are likely about 1 in 3. The rest will spend years going through lawyers, hearings, more appeals, and in the meantime no income except possibly SSI. BTW getting SSDI does not mean one qualifies for SSI. If you made a dollar above minimum wage before applying for disability chances are once you receive SSDI you will have to pay back the SSI from your first check which is back pay usually.
I know a few disabled persons. I know of no one on it fraudulently. There are much easier state and federal programs to access with a much lower burden of proof for assistance than disability.
For many lower income workers this will be their sole income if becoming disabled. Some who had better paying jobs or were under a great corporate benefits package may have additional coverage that some may mistake as SSDI. The standards for obtaining payment would vary from policy to policy.
The first thing a person usually looses when becoming disabled is their healthcare insurance. Generally within 60 days most employers stop paying. That means you are placed on COBRA which to a disabled person who can not work is just not a realistic option.
I disagree with the senators assessment on this issue. I would also bet that most disabled were likely blue collar low to lower middle class workers. It would make sense because they would likely be doing more physically demanding jobs. My last job out of about a dozen person I worked with over 5 years 4 of them died during that time and one went on disability. That one was me. Before I went to work there the foreman dropped dead in his office.
Your SSDI payment depends on what you paid in. Every ones payment varies due to what they paid in. Does anyone in here think they can live on $618 a month or maybe $813? I know persons who draw about that much. IOW it is by no means a get rich program for most. It is forced medical retirement. I know another person who draws $1500 a month.
There is a lot of waste and fraud in government no doubt but SSDI is about the strictest program there is.
From the disability side....I worked with a guy in the 1990s who had a brother who claimed disability. My co-worker was absolute in opinion that the injury was bogus. The guy was only pulling around $850 a month so it was hard for me to envision going this direction...for such a limited amount of money...and thinking you could really live off this.
Every kid (what % now?) diagnosed with ADD, ADHD (actually bored with lousey schools) or whatever the fad is SSI for life. There is no cure. They will be doped for life.
Find a welfare mom and I guarantee they are also getting SSI for a kid.
yitbos
yitbos
Really? How long ago was that? I just searched the procedure. It's still experimental from what I'm reading and a last resort procedure when meds fail to control seizure activity. IOW there would be a lot of vetting through several physicians for this procedure to even be considered.
Now sometimes EEG's do not pick up epileptic seizures. I can pass an EEG with flying colors and I have epileptic seizures. BTW there are many forms of it. Mine isn't the loose consciousness and fall down time. Mine jerks the living daylights out of my upper torso due to certain auditory and visual stimulations. Makes driving real interesting. LOL
There is also a procedure where such an electronic device is placed in the neck and connected to the brain for relief from severe depression. Again a last resort procedure it looks like.
You can't really. BTW the $600 and $800 dollar figures I mentioned? The $613 is my wifes. She is an incomplete quadriplegic and has been 25 years. The $830 or so I draw for mine which happened 16 years ago. It wasn't one single thing that put me there but a sum total some of which were life long problems that got worse.
I am not questioning your medical state, I am just telling you that this person that I know had this done many years ago at Columbia. Nobody in her family has ever seen her have a seizure and she is the type that if you closed your eyes she would rob you blind. Not to get too personal, but she is my wife’s sister. And let me just say one thing, in today’s day and age a person can convince a doctor to do anything that is exploratory. She collects SSDI and she works under the table and she drives.
Anyway, later a person came out through a door and yelled my name. I followed her and she took me to a desk where a blind computer operator was sitting - the actual SSA officer. The 'helper' took my paperwork and proceeded to sequence and speak each entry so the blind computer operator could enter it.
By the way, the blind computer operator effed it up and I got a letter in the mail later and I had to go back and do it all over again....
Also all the homo’s with aids.
I worked in a Rehab and used to drive the druggies and alcy’s to their SSI appointments. It used to make me sick to see what was going on.
I was diagnosed with it about 45 years ago. Look there is a real problem and there is a real disorder very similar to ADD/ADHD. The epidemic isn't pharmaceutical or even government program driven it is technology triggered.
There is a fairly recently discovery of a sensory processing problem called Central Auditory Processing Disorders. These are very real and far easier to prove than ADD ADHD. They require NO Medications except to treat possible conditions which may have caused it such as chronic sinus allergies or chronic ear infections as a child.
I did not have ADD/ADHD I have C.A.P.D. and a very dysfunctional auditory and visual processing system. You can look for C.A.P.D. in a kid right after Christmas. The new video games for example. The kid plays a while then becomes agitated and unable to concentrate. Here's more clues for C.A.P.D. instead of ADD ADHD. The inability to process oral instructions accurately without them being repeated several times. These kids are not ignoring you their brain is trying to process what you have told them. Ever tell a kid to so something then about the middle of the second or third time they suddenly get it?
The behavioral traits of ADHD and C.A.P.D. can be easily mistaken. That is why all kids need to be tested for C.A.P.D. by an Audiologist at an early age. No special federal funding is needed for them in class either. Other clues such as coordination may point to what I'm saying.
Getting help early on is essential. This might mean Occupational Therapy for more severe cases. For me that enabled me to pass my military entrance physicals and function in the workforce later into my mid 30's. BTW mine is a severe case not typical to most kids with C.A.P.D. The doctors {eye doctors actually} saw the issues 45 years ago in me but no medical name had been given it. I'm also single eye functional. Vision in both eyes but never at the same time.
Wrong, girl down the street from me got knocked up by a worthless druggie, in the last fifteen years he has spent ten in jail, they. Had three kids before her mother made the doc spade her. She has never worked a day in her life and now is on ssi. Claims she has a bad back, must have got from laying on it.
You ain’t been around welfare mothers I take it. A seriously large percentage get SSI “crazy” checks for their kids for ADH, etc.
1 in 19 Americans are on SSI and you say its hard to get. Read it again, Apparently it is NOT hard to get.
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