On June 22, 2024, SSA implemented a huge change to how they evaluate a person’s past relevant work to determine if they qualify for Social Security Disability benefits. I have received calls from several clients who read about the change and were alarmed because they did not understand it, so I decided to break it down to hopefully dispel any concerns about the change.
Prior to June 22, 2024, SSA looked at work performed within the past fifteen years to determine past relevant work at the fourth step of the sequential evaluation. Unfortunately, this resulted in claimants being denied disability benefits on the basis that they could perform work that they had not performed in many years, if not over a decade. With the change in June, now SSA can only consider past work to be relevant if it was performed within the past five years, and SSA will not consider work to be relevant if it began and ended in less than a thirty day period.
What this change does NOT mean is that SSA will only consider your previous five years of earnings to determine the amount you will receive per month. The rule change has no impact on how SSA determines the amount of your benefit.
This is one of the most significant and claimant-friendly changes that I have seen in my sixteen years of practice and should result in fewer baseless denials for claimants over age fifty. It is most definitely a cause for celebration for claimants and their attorneys.