Unemployment And Social Security Disability Claims

 Posted on January 21, 2012 in Social Security Disability

Can I Get Unemployment Benefits While I Am Trying To Get Disability?

The question above has been more mainstream these days, with the economy struggling and people finding it difficult to obtain gainful employment. It has become so mainstream that The Wall Street Journalrecently published an article on the issue stating, "The higher unemployment rate this year accounts for 3,000 additional people applying for benefits(disability) each week." The article went on to explain that "people have been doing this out of desperation."

A claimant does not typically have any financial issues to worry about when he or she applies for Social Security Disability Insurance benefits (SSDI) after exhausting their unemployment benefits. The issue is when a claimant applies for both at the same time. A claimant must certify that he or she is ready and able to work and will continuously look for employment in order to obtain unemployment benefits. This makes sense, since the very goal of unemployment is to aid workers in their job search and encourage them to go back to work. However, when someone files for Social Security disability benefits they are stating that they cannot perform full-time work at an SGA level. Ultimately, a claimant is basically saying that he or she can AND cannot work when applying for disability and unemployment at the same time. This can be a serious problem in court.

In general, judges do not like the idea of claimants who were getting unemployment benefits after their alleged onset date. It should be noted that receiving unemployment benefits does not automatically disqualify a claimant from applying for disability benefits. However, a judge could very well deny a claim using unemployment benefits as the rough framework for the decision. For this reason, it is not uncommon for Social Security disability lawyers to amend the onset date of the disability to some time after the unemployment benefits ran out.

Receiving unemployment benefits while applying for SSDI can be quite complicated. It is strongly recommended that you seek out a Social Security disability attorney to help you with this potential issue, especially if you are at the hearing level.

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