OQA's 15-Year Work History Documentation Study (5/1/01)
Disability claims and work history
Under the current processing of disability claims, the claimant is required to furnish his work history for the past fifteen years. This information is used to determine whether the claimant could return to relevant work he has done in the past or any other work.
What SSA aimed to discover
OQA undertook the 15-Year Work History Documentation Study to find out how shortening the documentation requirement to either ten or five years would affect the disability allowance rate.
How the study worked
In this study SSA looked at over 2,100 cases to see if a shortened work history would have resulted in the same decision. The study showed that the evidence in file would have supported the decision in nearly 1,700 cases under either a 10-year or a 5-year documentation requirement.
The conclusions
SSA concluded that the increase in the disability allowance rate would be very small, practically negligible, if either a 10-year or a 5-year work history documentation requirement were adopted. SSA sent a copy of the study to the Office of the Actuary for their review and approval.