Has disability become a 'de facto welfare program'?

NBC News ^ | March 28, 2013 | Barbara Raab

[rightwingintelligentsia]

When President Clinton signed "welfare reform" into law in 1996, he promised to end welfare as we know it. Now, some new reporting suggests we've created a new kind of welfare -- only most Americans aren't aware of it.

The number of people who depend on checks from Social Security's disability programs has soared in recent years, according to NPR's series "Unfit for Work: the Startling Rise of Disability in America." The reports, which began over the weekend and continue this week, raise the question: How disabled are the recipients, really? As you might imagine, they have touched a nerve.

A quick primer: the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program provides monthly cash assistance to people who are poor and disabled, including families with disabled children. The basic monthly SSI cash benefit is a set amount -- currently $710 for an individual and $1,066 for a couple. The Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) program also provides monthly cash assistance, to disabled people who have worked in jobs covered by Social Security. People who leave the workforce and go on disability also qualify for Medicare.

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After six months of investigation, NPR reporter Chana Joffee-Walt concluded that Social Security's disability programs have become "a de facto welfare program for people without a lot of education or job skills." In the past three decades, she reports, the number of Americans who are on disability has skyrocketed:

[apillar]

The problem with disability programs is that basically anybody, regardless of whether they are disabled or not can get on them as long as they are patient and hire a decent lawyer.

My ex-wife's sisters husband was a case in point, basically one day he decided he didn't want to work anymore, quit and filed for diability. He claimed he had bad knees, every doctor he went to told him his only problem was he was fat (about 350lbs) and if he lost weight his knee problems would go away. Well after several years of denials and appeals, his lawyer finally got him approved. Not only did he get a disability payment for the rest of his life, he also got all the back disability from the date he first applied. Basically guaranteed welfare for life that can't be taken away, must be nice to retire at 40...

[Safetgiver]

There is no question that Obama has turned SSI into a new Welfare program....Happened LONG before Obummer.

[cdcdawg]

There’s a guy around here who advertises as a “Social Security Representative”, and I’m fairly certain he’s not a lawyer. There must be some alternative certification that allows it. If so, it’s pretty strange. Lawyers generally guard their turf like no other profession.

[2 Kool 2 Be 4-Gotten]

Often enough, the “disability” is that they are FAT.

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Yes and the scam goes even further. I know (2nd hand but from a reliable source) that you have a fattie in her 50’s that gets put on SSI from being fat and now guess what - her daughter in her 20’s gets put on the govt. payroll to be her caretaker. Can you believe that ish?

[PapaBear3625]

My mother, now 61, had to stop working 2 years ago because of a series of heart attacks. She was warned that if she continued returning to work, she could expect to end up dead. She applied for disability 1 1/2 years ago and has been turned down multiple times and is going through an arbitration process of some sort at this time. They keep refusing her benefits and she's a candidate if I ever saw one. I'm not up to date on the details, but she is definitely unfit for work of just about any kind except maybe a low-stress desk job (if that even exists). She's not even supposed to be on her feet for more than 20 minutes at a time.

I suspect the probability of getting on disability increases if your Democratic precinct captain tells the right people that you are a reliable Dem voter.

[Hildred Castaigne]

For the life of me, I can’t figure out what makes her disabled (or lazy). Supposedly has back problems but it doesn’t keep her from doing anything.

Ah, but here's the kicker. In reviewing resumes at my employer, one of the things we require is a listing of any medical conditions you have. If you have back problems of any type? You get File 13ed. So will any smart employer. If you have back problems and you get hired, we have to provide special accommodations like a decent chair that won't get your back hurting - and that's expensive. Also, you could raise the company insurance premiums just by being employed and having back problems. So no go for your sister.

It's like a friend of mine who's 4'8 due to a spinal condition. Has a degree in business management, is very on top of things, has done great work...when she was able to be hired. But people don't like cripples working in an office with them and you have to provide desks she can sit at and so on, so too bad for her. Can she do the work? Absolutely! Will she do the work? In a heartbeat! Am I going to hire her? Only if I need to make a minority quota.

She eventually got disability after being unemployed for a decade; her spinal condition qualifies her for it. It took a lot of convincing; she didn't want to do it. I finally had to lay it out straight to her; Corporate America doesn't want people who look like her in the office. Neither does a smart small business. You want young attractive types with no visible problems so the clients enjoy coming in.

It's an ugly truth, but the truth often is.

[ilovesarah2012]

U.S. sues Starbucks for firing dwarf from barista job

The U.S. government is suing Starbucks Coffee Company for firing a barista in El Paso because she is a dwarf.

When the employee asked for a stool or small stepladder to perform her job, Starbucks denied the request and fired her that same day, claiming that she could be a danger to customers and workers, according to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

The commission, which filed the lawsuit on Monday, said that Starbucks violated federal law by denying a reasonable accommodation to the employee, who was hired in July 2009 and was fired after three days of training.

“Starbucks has become a virtual icon of modern American culture, appealing to an incredibly diverse customer base,” Robert Canino, a commission lawyer in Dallas, said in a statement. “We’d hope that when considering hiring a person with a disability, Starbucks would choose to enhance its brand with the mark of equal opportunity and access.”

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/05/17/us-dwarf-starbucks-idUSTRE74G60020110517

[pass-the-biscuits-please]

The “Autism spectrum” is real. Actually kids that are higher on the spectrum imo are more deserving of help than lower kids because they have a shot to hold down jobs and be taxpayers while the more severe kids will most likely always be state wards.

It’s a real thing. Nothing made up. You don’t understand until you have one, but I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Toughest thing I’ve ever dealt with.

[TurboZamboni]

leftists have thoroughly infiltrated the military as well.

I know vets who've schemed together on how to ‘flunk’ hearing tests to get disability for tinnitus among other things.

[Hildred Castaigne]

When the employee asked for a stool or small stepladder to perform her job, Starbucks denied the request and fired her that same day, claiming that she could be a danger to customers and workers, according to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

You see, that's where the manager of that Starbucks screwed up. You don't deny the special accomodation request and then fire for possible coworker endangerment. Even in right-to-work, that won't pass muster.

What you do is smile and nod, absolutely grant the request, deliver a timeframe in which it will be fulfilled...and then in that timeframe, accumulate enough disciplinary action to fire her. "You were late by 1 minute." "Your till is $5 short." "We've had multiple complaints from clientele about your rudeness." 4-5 write-ups later, you fire her. Then, if EEOC comes calling, you go "Oh, no, we didn't fire her for being a dwarf. No way. Check our write-ups! That's why we fired her!"

It boggles me that management doesn't know the easy ways these days.

[Iron Munro]

Yep.

Obama has converted it into just another wealth redistribution scam.

[Sybeck1]

Crazy check?

[hoosierham]

my neighbor fits that-he is on legal painkillers,and like many has become addicted

[ZX12R]

my neighbor fits that-he is on legal painkillers,and like many has become addicted

I know someone that gets disability because they are an alcoholic.

[Iron Munro]

The problem with disability programs is that basically anybody, regardless of whether they are disabled or not can get on them as long as they are patient and hire a decent lawyer.

I know that is the way it was, but since Obama has been in office they have basically thrown the doors open.

I know of several people who have no real medical problems - their "disability" is that they eat too much. They are just too fat to get through the door from over-eating and are just as lazy as the day is long. They were prepared to go through the routine - file, get rejected, get a lawyer, refile and refile.

But they were approved the first time with no hassles.

It just really gets me P.O.'d to see people like that virtually stealing taxpayer money that is intended to help the truly disabled.

[bert]

Yes....

It is welfare for those who choose not to work

It is special welfare for lawyers that plead the rejected cases

It is welfare for black women who shuffle all the papers

[Sequoyah101]

Yup. We know one of those. Worked for years on getting his disability and finally did so he can be a Pentecostal Preacher. He was a truck driver. So proud to know a goodly and honorable man of God.

[Colonel Kangaroo]

Part of the problem is that we don't have a high enough number of young people in this nation doing their turn at physical labor and moving onward and upward. They get into the college-debt system and make their first significant entrance into the labor force in non-physical work, never having to strain their strong bodies by toting bags, picking okra or being a human auxiliary and servant to a machine.

Meanwhile, the people on the grunt work track see much of the upward mobility in the country being claimed by the semi-educated young products of our system of "higher-learning". Given that they are stuck into middle age doing young people's work, it's no wonder that many start to break down around the age of forty and become disabled for the work that they do.

I think a revolution in the way this nation thinks about education and upward mobility would go a long way to reducing disability. But the education industry would never allow it.

[MrB]

The only way “out” is “through”.

The system will have to collapse, and it will.

[Iron Munro]

The only way “out” is “through”. The system will have to collapse, and it will.

Said to say, I too have begun to think we are past the 'point of no return'.

The re-election of Barack Obama shows that the mad, insane stampede to the liberal Utopian Hell is probably irreversable at this time.

A collapse will be incredibly destructive and deadly, but short of some massive outside force, like a nuclear holocaust, there is probably no way to turn the majority away from their self destructive ways.