Most Georgia residents will work full-time jobs the majority of their lives. A popular age to retire is often age 65. If an adult works full time from the age of adulthood, 18-years-old, until age of retirement, which is often 65, they will have worked 47 years. In those 47 years, it is very possible to assume that one may become injured, ill or otherwise unable to work. Some workers suffer injury or illness due to an incident or exposure at work and it can impact the rest of their lives.
There are a few programs available that can aid in helping injured workers. One such program helps workers by awarding SSDI benefits for injuries. SSDI benefits are not limited to those injured on the job, simply those who are unable to work due an injury. However, many of those injuries are sustained due to an accident or incident that happened at work. The federal government sought out to better understand how a work injury can affect workers based on age and how that affects SSDI benefits. It’s important to know more because in one year alone, DI benefits paid out roughly $95 billion to injured workers.
After thorough research it was determined that age greatly affected the impact that work injury had on social security disability. Generally, the older the injured worker the more likely that the worker would be rendered unable to work and thus be a beneficiary of SSDI benefits. For those who have been injured at work, your age could affect your ability to heal and get back in the workplace. Thus, an older injured worker may be a more likely recipient of SSDI benefits than a younger injured worker.
SSDI benefits are not simply granted due to work injury or age. They must be requested on behalf of the injured that is unable to work. SSDI benefits could be approved in the short or long-term. One may need to provide certain information that displays proof of their inability to work and of their legitimate injury.
Source: ssa.gov, “Workplace Injuries and the take-up of Social Security Disability benefits,” Accessed Jan. 30, 2017