When you work and earn income, you contribute to the Social Security System. This money you pay into Social Security is not reserved for you; the Social Security Administration (SSA) pays that money to current beneficiaries. What you receive in return are ‘work credits’. When you retire or become unable to work due to the disability, you or your immediate family may receive monthly benefits based on reported earnings or work credits.

You can start receiving your benefits at the official retirement age of 66, or you can request early retirement at age 62. If you collect benefits before your official retirement age, you receive a smaller amount, and you will never be able to recover the full amount.

People who cannot work due to disability and are not yet of retirement age must submit a disability application and evidence to prove that they are disabled. They can also receive Medicare at any age after they have been declared disabled for two years. The SSA administers these benefits through the Social Security disability program by sending monthly disability payments to people who can no longer work due to mental or physical disabilities.

What you need to know about the Social Security disability program

Simply being diagnosed with a physical or mental illness does not mean you will receive benefits immediately. You must meet certain eligibility criteria or your condition must significantly limit your ability to perform your daily activities.

In other words, even if your doctor diagnoses or labels you with a serious illness, you still have to take a few extra steps to get those benefits. You must meet the financial eligibility for SSI (also known as technical requirements) and the medical requirements for SSI and SSD.

Financial Eligibility Requirements for SSD and SSI

Your SSD depends on your insured status with the SSA. Your insured status is determined by your past income. This includes the total number of quarters you worked and contributed to Social Security, including the number of quarters you worked in the years before your disability began. The date you stopped working full-time defines the start or start date of your disability claim.

In general, to qualify, a person must have worked at least twenty of the forty quarters before the date on which their disability forced them to stop working. However, younger workers can acquire insured status with fewer credits. Once a person leaves a job, he/she generally has a five-year window before losing SSD insured status – this is called “Date Last Insured” (“DLI”). A disabled person can still apply even if the DLI has passed, but to be technically eligible, he or she must prove that the disability occurred at a point before that last insured date.

Medical requirements

For SSD and SSI, the definition of disability is a severe physical or mental handicap or a combination of both that has lasted twelve months or more (or is expected to last twelve months or more) that prevents the person from engaging in substantial activity and lucrative.

A substantial gainful activity” (“SGA”) is “work that involves the performance of substantial and productive physical or mental tasks for payment or profit.”

Paid work” is work that is usually done to receive payment or profit, regardless of whether profit occurs or not. In general, if you continue to earn income from an employer or as a self-employed employee above the amount listed in the regulations, you will be presumed to have the ability to have paid work.

Typically, a paid job is determined by the hours worked and the monthly amount of income earned. Jobs that have more hours than part-time jobs can be considered paid jobs. Additionally, the established amount that qualifies as paid work is adjusted each year to take inflation into account. Applicants who meet the definition of blindness are allowed to earn more and are still considered disabled.

What you need to know – A simple summary

We’ve covered a lot of information, so let’s do a quick review so you have a very clear understanding of everything that this process entails.

When you work, the Social Security Administration takes part of your earnings and puts them in its fund with the promise that the money will be there later when you retire. People usually receive their Social Security benefits when they retire, whether they decided to take early retirement or decided to retire later with full benefits. If you are disabled, your work history entitles you to benefits. You must complete an application and provide additional documents and medical records to prove that you are no longer able to work and that you deserve to receive benefits.

An experienced and knowledgeable attorney can help you and offer much-needed advice during this process, which could make all the difference in your case.

The SSA calculates benefit amounts using a specific formula. When a person works, he or she adds credits each quarter by making payments to the fund. Usually, a person needs to work at least 20 of the past 40 quarters, or about five of the 10 years before the onset of disability, to qualify for disability benefits. The Social Security Administration uses a different calculation for younger workers under age 31, who have not been in the labor force for 10 years. When a person leaves their job, they do not automatically lose their Social Security disability insurance but rather have a five-year window until the “Date Last Insured” (DLI).