Social Security Disability Insurance May Reduce Benefits by 2016: Population at Financial Risk from Reductions

Abstract

In the United States, 10.9 million people are receiving Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits with an average pay of $12,000 per year. If the U.S. House of Congress fails to enact a new bill by the end of fiscal-year 2016, SSDI benefits are estimated to be reduced by $2,300 per-person per year. In the pass, the U.S. Congress has always found a way to enact new bills capable of maintains benefits at existing levels. The specific aim of this project was to report the number of people potentially at risk for experiencing an economic impact if SSDI benefits are reduced. The cross-sectional analysis used data from the American Community Survey, 2009-2013 Public Use Microdata Sample file. Characteristics on a total of 153,627 actual survey participants were used to generalize findings to 2,748,735 residents of the United States. Results indicate non-Hispanic Whites, the Pacific and South Atlantic geographic divisions are at the largest risk for being affected by changes to SSDI benefits.

Keywords::

• Poverty
• minorities
• aging
• ACS
• PUMS
• federal benefits
• insurance
• policy

Funding

This article was prepared and submitted for review while the author was supported by grant numbers AG000181 and U01 AG023744 from the National Institute of Aging at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) at the University of Pittsburgh, PA (AB Newman).