Step 5 in Determining Oklahoma Social Security Disability Eligibility

Are you able to perform a significant number of other jobs in the regional or national economy?

A. General description of step five.
If the Social Security Administration determines that you cannot perform your past relevant work, the next step is to determine whether there are a significant number of other jobs in the regional economy that you can perform. In making that determination, the Social Security Administration considers your age, your education, skills that you have learned in past jobs, and your residual functional capacity ("RFC"). Your RFC is a description of your functional limitations, and it may include restrictions such as (1) the amount of weight that you can lift or carry, (2) the length of time you can stand continuously, (3) the length of time you can sit continuously, (4) your mental limitations with respect to working with other employees or the public, (5) environmental restrictions, etc.

If the Social Security Administration determines that there are a significant number of jobs in the regional economy that you can perform, you will be determined to be "not disabled." However, if it is determined that there are not a significant number of jobs that you can perform, you will be found to be "disabled."

B. What if no one will hire you?
A common misunderstanding many claimants have is that they believe they are disabled because no one will hire them. The fact that no one will hire you makes no difference to the Social Security Administration. The sole question is whether you could perform a job if someone would hire you for that job. If there are a significant number of jobs you could perform, you are not disabled, even if no one will hire you.

C. What if you could not live on the salary from the jobs the Social Security Administration believes you could perform?
This is another common misunderstanding. People say "I couldn't possibly live on the income from that job." That simply doesn't matter. If you earned $50,000 per year in your former job that you can no longer perform, you won't be found to be disabled if you could perform the job of "ticket taker" at a movie theater for minimum wage. It makes absolutely no difference that you don't believe you could live on that income.

D. The effect of age on the determination of disability.
One of the factors considered at step five of the sequential evaluation is your age. The law recognizes that it is more difficult for us to learn new skills as we get older. For example, the law recognizes that a person who is over 50 years of age would have difficulty learning new skills that would be required for many sedentary jobs, such as computer skills. Therefore, if a claimant is over 50, and the claimant is limited to performing jobs that are classified as "sedentary" jobs, the claimant will be found to be disabled if he/she does not already have any skills that would enable him/her to perform some of those sedentary jobs. Sedentary jobs are generally those jobs that don't require lifting more than 10 pounds and don't require standing more than 2 hours total in an 8-hour day.

Similarly, a person who is over 55 years of age will be found to be disabled if that person is limited to "light" work and he/she does not already have any skills that would enable him/her to perform some of those jobs.

In other words, the law clearly makes it easier for a person to be found to be disabled after that person reaches age 50. This doesn't mean that it is easy to get disability benefits after a person turns 50. On the contrary, it is still very difficult to meet the criteria for disability. A claimant must still be able to show, at step four, that he/she cannot perform his/her past relevant work. However, at step five, the law definitely helps those who are over 50 years of age.