When Bureaucracy Got in the Way of Compassion

By Annelise Cummings
August 6th 2018

I haven’t seen Steve for over a year. A homeless man who set up shop near my bus stop, Steve was the image of the stereotypical homeless man. Ill-fitting clothes and a lack of personal hygiene associated with having a place to stay, Steve spent his days trying to get donations from the passers-by to fund his stays at a local hospital on bad nights. The last time I saw him, he told me about how his waiting was finally over and that in a few weeks he would be receiving his Disability Social Security Income including back pay going back fifteen months. Up till that point, he was a common fixture of the landscape that was my journey home from school. I haven’t seen him for over a year and I pray that it’s because he has people looking out for him.

It was a hot summer day in the middle of August when I first worked up the courage to talk to Steve. I had just finished taking a summer course and was walking back from an awkward lunch date that wasn’t going anywhere. He had taken me to a Vietnamese food truck where I bought an overpriced sandwich that made me nauseous (I’m often nauseous but the food didn’t help). I had probably finished a third of the sandwich and was prepared to throw it away knowing I wouldn’t eat it before I got home nor would I eat it as leftovers. The only question was when I was going to dispose of my responsibility to this sandwich. It was then that I saw Steve.

I ignored the warnings and offered my remaining sandwich to Steve, letting him know what it was, where I got it from, and what I couldn’t do with it. He accepted it with grace and told me how he would save it for dinner commenting on how now the money he collected during the day could be spent on temporary boarding at a local hospital for $8 a night. It was then that I got to hear more about his story.

He told me how long he had been homeless and how he struggles to get a job because of his disability. The walker he sat on was not for show. He had developed a bad back from an accident a few years back and it now prevented him from being able to hold down a job. Contrary to the stereotype, he didn’t become homeless due to drugs and alcohol. Just pure dumb luck.

He told me about how he was a functioning member of society until his disability and pain became too much and he had to leave his job. When I talked to him on later encounters he let me know about how he was seeking disability benefits through the Social Security Disability Program but was having trouble scraping the money together and filling out the paperwork. Until he could get approved and awarded back payment (payments by Social Security to account for the money he should have received since the disability started), he would be living on the streets saving as much money as he could.

Disability is not rare in our society. Though not often talked about, the colloquial statistic thrown around states 1 in 5 Americans have a disability. Further research suggests that the number was around 12.6% in 2015 (Paws research Center). The discrepancy accounts for people with a disability who are not disabled by said disability. The numbers change depending on the demographic surveyed. Elderly people (75 and older) are cited at 49.8% while Native Americans are cited at 17.7%. As a result, to be disabled is to be apart of one of the largest minorities in the world covering a broad cross-section of race, age, sex, religion, and socioeconomic status. Despite about 12.6% of the general population being disabled, upwards of 40% of the homeless population is disabled.

The Social Security Act was signed into law by President Roosevelt in August 1935. It was designed to be a program to support retired workers (65 and older) into retirement. The basic features were,

“the insurance principle under which a group of person’s are ‘insured’ in some way against a defined risk, and a social element which usually means that the program is shaped by broader social objectives, rather than being shaped solely by the self-interest of the individual participants.” (Social Security Website)

Over the years, we have expanded Social Security Benefits to provide assistance to people in the case of death, unemployment, and disability. Provided the individual has at one point for a period of two consecutive years, contributed to the program, they were entitled benefits in the case of tragedy.

The Social Security Program has noble goals in supporting at-risk groups. In practice, the distribution of wealth particular for people with disabilities is sparse at best. The program consistently rejects every application upon first viewing. Disability claims alone have a 67% denial rate regardless of the quality of the claim. The number jumps up to 87% for the first appeal. If you are denied in your appeal of the original claim, you are allowed to have a court hearing where you can plead your case to a judge in hopes that they will overrule the decision and grant you benefits.

The last time I talked to Steve he had just been granted benefits following a hearing. Disabled and unable to work, Steve was waiting patiently for the system to take care of him like it has promised. Despite being clearly unemployed, homeless, and disabled, he was denied benefits and had to continually drudge through the bureaucracy that was put into place to help people like him. By all accounts, the people in the system should have had compassion for people like him.

So where does this land Steve? Honestly, I don’t know. Like I said before, it’s been over a year since I last saw him setting up shop by my bus stop. Whether it means he managed to get back on his feet and has a job and steady housing or like millions of others, he died waiting for his benefits to arrive in the mail I may never know. I hope it’s the first one and that someday we’ll reevaluate the systems we put in place and ask ourselves whether we are truly taking care of the people our systems are meant to protect.

Articles referenced in this piece:

• A website outlining disability secrets. This article specifically talks about Social Security Disability Denials and what it means: https://www.disabilitysecrets.com/disability-denial.html

• A not-so-brief history of the Social Security program in America produced by the organization themselves on their website: https://www.ssa.gov/history/briefhistory3.html

• Facts about Disability from a 2015 Survey: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/07/27/7-facts-about-americans-with-disabilities/

• Disability and Homelessness facts and figures: https://www.disabilityscoop.com/2009/07/16/homeless-report/4153/