For Ajax's disability concern

[_Kevin Graham]

Fox's Single Example Of Obama's Supposed Entitlement "Explosion" Is A Long-Debunked Myth

Fox News' Bill O'Reilly baselessly claimed that the "explosion of disability payments in this country" is an "undeniable" fact that contradicts President Obama's point that "we have not massively expanded the welfare state."

O'Reilly's comments came on the February 4 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends during a discussion of his recent interview with President Obama. O'Reilly cited disability benefits as an example of what Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy called the "massively expanded the welfare state" and claimed that government is "getting conned like crazy" by disability beneficiaries. He failed to cite any further examples of the supposedly expanding "Nanny State" that Fox's on-air graphics hyped.

In reality, a recent study from the Social Security Administration's actuaries found that the total allowance rate for disability benefits has fallen significantly during Obama's presidency. As the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has noted, "[s]tandards don't become more lax in recessions, and stories that focus only on the growth in applications omit that crucial fact."

[_ajax18]

In the words Tom Coburn MD, "It's in the statue. If there is a job in the economy you are capable of doing, you shouldn't qualify for disability."

Just because you don't believe the job pays a "living wage" should not be an acceptable reason to opt for drawing a check in lieu of work.

While those drawing a check aren't getting rich off SSA, a few doctors and lawyers are as outlined in Congressman Coburn's investigation.

http://www.coburn.senate.gov/public/ind ... e7890232f1

• Mr. Conn Obtained Millions in Attorney Fees Paid by SSA. From cases on the DB Lists alone, over the four year period from 2006 to 2010, the Social Security Administration paid Mr. Conn over $4.5 million in attorney fees.10 Social Security records show that, altogether in 2010, Mr. Conn was the third highest paid disability law firm in the country due to its receipt of over $3.9 million in attorney fees from the Social Security Administration. In 2009, Mr. Conn received a total of $3.5 million in attorney fees from the agency.

• Mr. Conn Paid Doctors Substantial Fees for Evaluations. The doctors used by Mr. Conn to evaluate his claimants were also paid substantial fees. A review of records found that, over the past six years, Mr. Conn paid five doctors almost $2 million to provide disability opinions for his claimants. Mr. Conn contracted with his claimants to repay the fees given to the doctors to perform their medical evaluations.

• Daugherty Bank Records Show $96,000 in Unexplained Cash Deposits. From 2003 to 2011, Judge Daugherty’s bank records contain regularly occurring cash deposits totaling $69,800, the source of which is unexplained in the judge’s financial disclosure forms. From 2007 to 2011, his daughter’s bank records list similar cash deposits totaling another $26,200. When asked about the $96,000 in cash deposits, Judge Daugherty refused to explain their origin or the source of the funds.

• SSA Whistleblower Targeted by Huntington Chief Judge Andrus and Eric Conn. Following the public disclosure of Mr. Conn’s relationship with Judge Daugherty, Huntington Chief ALJ Andrus worked with Mr. Conn to discredit and retaliate against an SSA employee suspected of leaking the information.

• Mr. Conn Destroyed Documents during an Investigation. After talking with SSA OIG investigators, Mr. Conn contracted with a local shredding company to destroy over 26,000 pounds of documents, the equivalent of 2.6 million sheets of paper. Former Conn law firm personnel asserted that he destroyed all hard copies of the DB Lists as well as computer hard drives in his office.

[_Analytics]

In the words Tom Coburn MD, "It's in the statue. If there is a job in the economy you are capable of doing, you shouldn't qualify for disability."

So, it looks like you agree with Tom Coburn on this issue and think the law does in fact say what it ought to say. The only issue is how many people are committing fraud? This Conn guy is under a microscope and is being investigated by Congress, the FBI, the Kentucky Bar, Sixty Minutes, and Fox News.

On the surface, the Conn situation seems relatively isolated. The truth is that it is quite difficult to get the Social Security administration to approve disability claims—even if the claim is valid. That system is designed to error on the side of denying claims. For a lawyer to systematically commit SSDI fraud would require the collusion of licensed physicians and federal judges—two cohorts of people with a ton to lose for committing fraud and for what? If an attorney successfully wins a disability case, he receives a contingency fee of up to 25% of past-due benefits, limited to $6,000. Getting a judge, lawyer, and physician to act unethically in order to split among themselves $6,000 seems quite unlikely.

[_ajax18]

Getting a judge, lawyer, and physician to act unethically in order to split among themselves $6,000 seems quite unlikely.

That's just one case. They were churning out at least 20 of these every day. That's how you get $4.5 million in attorneys fees from SSA from 2006-2010.

I'm sure some of this is a matter of opinion and what would qualify as outright fraud in court is a high standard to prove. And yes I'm sure there are people who have been denied disability who are in worse shape than some who qualified for disability. Everyone gets denied the first time but if you're willing to wait it out and apply a 3rd and 4th time a good attorney will get you on disability no matter how unfounded the claim is.

Dr. Coburn MD found what many of us suspected when he pulled a sample of random disability files. More than 50% of those people should not have been on disability, 25% of them were questionable and maybe 25% at most were legitimate. We all have some aches and pains and those aches and pains seem to get a lot bigger when you're choosing between a minimum wage job and a free check with/ full healthcare. That's one reason the minimum wage needs to be raised is to give these people an incentive to work through the aches and pains and get off what has become the de facto welfare program in this country.

[_Analytics]

That's just one case. They were churning out at least 20 of these every day. That's how you get $4.5 million in attorneys fees from SSA from 2006-2010.

Touche, but his practice was unique in scope.

I'm sure some of this is a matter of opinion and what would qualify as outright fraud in court is a high standard to prove. And yes I'm sure there are people who have been denied disability who are in worse shape than some who qualified for disability. Everyone gets denied the first time but if you're willing to wait it out and apply a 3rd and 4th time a good attorney will get you on disability no matter how unfounded the claim is.

The fact of the matter is that the Social Security administration only approves about 30% of initial claims. Upon reconsiderations and appeals, another 15% get approved. This implies that if you are originally denied, you have about a 20% chance of getting that initial decision reversed, regardless of how hard you try.

http://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/statcomp ... ect04.html

Dr. Coburn MD found what many of us suspected when he pulled a sample of random disability files. More than 50% of those people should not have been on disability, 25% of them were questionable and maybe 25% at most were legitimate.

CFR. Senator Dr. Tom Coburn lead a study on this in 2012 that reported that slightly "more than a quarter of agency decisions failed to properly address insufficient, contradictory, or incomplete evidence. The report’s findings corroborate a 2011 internal quality review conducted by SSA itself, which found that on average nationwide, disability decisions made at the ALJ level had errors or were insufficient 22 percent of the time."

So according to Dr. Coburn's own report, at least 75% of people who had claims approved were handled correctly and were valid claims. Of the 25% of the cases that "failed to properly address insufficient, contradictory, or incomplete evidence," they don't estimate how many would have been approved anyway, had the evidence been "properly addressed."

So if Senator Coburn really thinks that at most 25% of disability claims are legitimate, why did he say the opposite in his report?

If you assume that the SSDI made the right decision for the 55% of applicants who never get their SSDI claims approved, and if you agreee with Coburn that the SSA got it right with 75% of the claims it does approve, that means they make the right decision almost 90% of the time.

We all have some aches and pains and those aches and pains seem to get a lot bigger when you're choosing between a minimum wage job and a free check with/ full healthcare. That's one reason the minimum wage needs to be raised is to give these people an incentive to work through the aches and pains and get off what has become the de facto welfare program in this country.

I totally agree with you on the minimum wage issue. It's also worth noting that that Senator Coburn's report says that having health insurnace tied to work as it was in the pre-Obamacare world "likely exacerbated" the problem, because when people with chronic conditions lost their jobs, they also lost their health insurance. When many of these people lost their health insurance, chronic conditions that they had successfully managed with medical care became disabling conditions that made it impossible to work.

So in addition to a strong minimum wage, can you also see the benefit of having universal healthcare?

[_ajax18]

So if Senator Coburn really thinks that at most 25% of disability claims are legitimate, why did he say the opposite in his report?

Ok, my error.

So in addition to a strong minimum wage, can you also see the benefit of having universal healthcare?

That would be one positive externality. I'm not sure it justifies Obamacare, but yes keeping people healthy enough to work when it's at all possible is good thing IMHO. It's like you proposed before on this issue. We need to find a way for disabled people to continue to contribute rather than just writing people checks. I've worked with people who were totally blind as a part of my training and seen them manage to become very productive. I've seen medicaid deny claims for basic hand held magnifiers that would have allowed people with low vision to function in a work environment. They'd rather just write these people a check. Maybe that looks good to some government accountant but to me it was a terrible way to appropriate resources.

that means they make the right decision almost 90% of the time.

10% of 14 million Americans collecting disability is still a lot of fraud. That means there are 1.4 million moochers out there getting away with a check for the rest of their life.

[_moksha]

Republicans are cutting-edge adopters of random input computer enhanced talking point generation.