Long-Term Work Activity and Use of Employment Supports Among New Supplemental Security Income Recipients

This article presents long-term cumulative statistics on the extent to which individuals who began receiving Supplemental Security Income (SSI) disability payments from 1996 through 2006 found work and used SSI work incentives. Among the 2001 award cohort, for which the richest data are available, 18.6 percent had worked by December 2007; 8.4 percent had had their SSI payments suspended because of work, but qualified for eligibility extensions under SSI's Section 1619(b) work incentive in at least 1 month; and 9.8 percent had had their payments suspended or terminated because of work regardless of their 1619(b) status. The corresponding percentages are much higher for those who were younger than 40 when they entered the SSI program for the first time as adults. In a substantial share of the months in which SSI payments were suspended or terminated because of work income, however, these individuals received Social Security Disability Insurance benefits.