Could You Use a Boost Getting Disability Benefits?
Monthly income to help pay your bills. Access to Medicare to cover your health problems.
Most of all: A sense that you can reach a place of stability after medical conditions force you to stop working.
Social Security Disability benefits provide all of it.
The trouble is, over three-quarters of people get denied for disability benefits on their first application.
What could help you get in the smaller group that wins benefits?
Possibly, your age.
If you’re over 50 years old, your chances of winning Social Security Disability improve.
But it’s not automatic. You have to show Social Security how your age combined with your health impairments and your work experience combine to qualify you for benefits.
Nash Disability Law works with this process every day.
We’ve helped more Chicago area people get benefits than any other law firm.
Talk to us for help applying for Social Security Disability over 50.
Social Security Disability Age Brackets
Social Security looks at your disability claim from several angles. One of the factors is age.
In deciding whether it thinks you truly need financial support in the form of disability benefits, the government puts you into these categories:
- Ages 18-49: At these ages, Social Security calls you a “Younger Person.” To them that means you’re more likely able to switch to different, new jobs, even if your health prevents you from doing your past job.
- Ages 50-54: This is an age group that Social Security Disability benefits are more clearly designed to help. You’re not expected to be as flexible about switching to new lines of work if you face a health interruption. Social Security calls it “Closely Approaching Advanced Age.”
- Ages 55 and Above: When you’re between 55 and retirement age, Social Security considers health problems to be even more limiting for you in terms of which types of work you could do. Now they say you are a “Person of Advanced Age.”
Once you reach retirement age, you switch to retirement benefits.
Social Security Disability—particularly Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits—were created to help you when you’ve worked a substantial amount, but you run into health conditions that push you out of the workforce before retirement age.
It’s there to fill a gap between working and paying into Social Security through your paychecks and qualifying for retirement.
Let the Chicago disability lawyers at Nash Disability Law look at your situation and let you know how benefits could help you.
