Policy Options for the Social Security Disability Insurance Program.

摘要

The Social Security Disability Insurance program is one component of the framework of support that is the federal Social Security system, which comprises the Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance programs. The DI program provides income to nonelderly adults who have worked in the past but whom the Social Security Administration (SSA) now deems unable to work because of a medical condition that is expected to last more than one year or to result in death. Only workers who are younger than the full retirement age--established for the Old-Age component of Social Security--can be eligible for DI benefits. Disabled beneficiaries receive monthly payments based on their past earnings for as long as they remain in the program. (Some family members of disabled beneficiaries, including certain spouses and children, are also eligible for benefits.) If DI beneficiaries remain disabled and live to their full retirement age, they transfer to the Social Security retirement program at that age, but their benefits do not change. In May 2012, the DI program provided benefits to 10.8 million people. More than 80 percent of them, or 8.7 million people, were disabled workers; about 18 percent, or 1.9 million, were children of those workers; and fewer than 2 percent, or 166,000, were spouses of those workers.