Texas Placed 3rd Worst for Number of Persons Dying While Waiting for Disability Payments

According to Social Security Benefit statistics, new applicants for disability benefits must wait upwards of seven months for their applications to be approved.

Social Security Statistics

Despite the fact that fewer people have sought for disability benefits over the past three years, the situation is only growing worse, according to a USA Facts analysis. An independent nonprofit organization called USA facts gathers data. It explained just published Social Security statistics from January 2023.

A lady with a disability named Diedres Cortes remarked, “I have to strap them on like that.”

Leg braces are something she wears every day.

I’m quite weak and shaky, Cortes said.

She said that she has partial paralysis.

Cortes stated, “Some days are better than others.”

Nearly three years have passed since she attempted to petition for long-term disability, and she is still awaiting word on her eligibility.

After around eight months, they rejected me for the first time, Cortes claimed.

Delays for Applicants with Disabilities

The most recent social security statistics, which were released earlier this month, show that delays for applicants with disabilities have gotten worse over the previous three years.

The report also reveals a 142% rise in backlog in Texas. And the majority of those who apply never get their benefit requests accepted. 2 out of 3 candidates are rejected nationally.

Cortes wishes for some respite as quickly as possible.

Many people pass away before receiving their impairment, according to Cortes. “I gained my son, or I would have died.”

According to Social Security Data, each year, 10,000 people nationwide pass away while waiting for the outcome of disability applications, and 8,000 applicants end up declaring bankruptcy.

Other Reports, Disability Benefits

Austin’s Disability Determination Division was on the verge of collapse.

Nearly 130,000 claims were pending review within its enormous two-story warehouse by the state personnel who assist determine whether Texans will get disability payments from the Social Security Administration; the backlog would need at least a year to resolve. Since January, about 40% of the examiners have left their jobs due to excessive workloads and inadequate pay that could not compete in the high-tech boomtown. Those who persisted worked at home or in a maze of cubicles, poring over enormous medical records.

Then, during a single week in September, the unimaginable happened: 75,000 brand-new claims were abruptly directed to a computerized queue that was already straining under two and a half years of pressure due to the coronavirus epidemic.

According to advocates and claimants, the avalanche of new cases was yet another indicator that the broken bureaucracy in the Texas state government off Interstate 35 had to be remembered. This failure has prevented thousands of poor, disabled, and increasingly desperate people from receiving the benefits they require to survive.

The same system, which Congress devised over seven decades ago to let low-paid state employees to decide who should receive federal benefits, has disintegrated in many of the other state offices where Social Security has outsourced evaluations of disability claims.