Employed But Have Trouble Doing My Job, Can I Apply For Disability?

There are times when an individual can be employed and still apply for disability benefits. In these cases, an individual must be earning under the substantial gainful activity, or SGA monthly amount.

What is SGA? Each year Social Security sets an amount that it considers equivalent to substantial gainful work activity, a work activity level at which the social security administration no longer considers an individual to be disabled.

To apply for disability an individual who is engaged in work activity must be below the monthly substantial gainful work activity amount. Of course, Social Security will not prevent anyone from filing for disability even if they are working full time.

However...if an individual files for disability with Social Security and they are working over the SGA amount, their claim will be denied at the Social Security office. This means that the individual’s disability claim will not be sent to the state disability agency for any kind of medical determination. Social Security calls this type of denial a technical denial, and even though the individual has the right to appeal a SGA denial it will most likely do no good even if they stop working the very next day (think about it: the basis of the denial would have nothing to do with any medical issues since a medical determination had not been made, so what would be the point of filing an appeal?).

Social Security makes all SGA determinations based upon what work an individual is performing the day they make their disability application. To better understand why Social Security does SGA denials, one just needs to review the Social Security definition of disability.

Social Security defines disability as any medical or mental condition that A) has prevented an individual from performing SGA for twelve months, B) is expected to prevent SGA performance for twelve continuous months, or...C) may be expected to result in the individual’s death.

In summary, Social Security is not concerned that an individual may be having a hard time performing their job as long as they are performing that job and earning at least the SGA amount. Basically, this means that even if an individual has a severe medical or mental impairment but they are still somehow able to work at a substantial gainful work activity amount they are not disabled according to the rules and guidelines of the Social Security disability program.









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Social Security Disability Secrets

Social Security Disability Benefit Questions



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