.c The Associated Press
By LAURA MECKLER
WASHINGTON (AP) - Beginning Thursday, people with disabilities may earn up to
$700 per month - $200 more than the old limit - before losing their federal
benefits.
The Social Security Administration estimates the change will benefit about
27,000 people and cost $1.2 billion through 2004.
It is the first increase in earnings allowed since 1990 and is part of the
Clinton administration's effort to encourage the disabled to work. The Social
Security Administration made the adjustment through regulation.
Separately, the Senate just passed legislation giving people with
disabilities other incentives to work, including the ability to keep
government health insurance. Similar legislation, which President Clinton
supports, is pending in the House.
The new rules affect both of the federal government's disability programs.
The Social Security Disability Insurance program aids people of all incomes
who have worked for at least 10 years before becoming disabled.
Beginning Thursday, applicants to the program may earn up to $700 each month
and still qualify, and they may earn that much once they are on the program
and still keep their benefits. If they exceed $700, all benefits cease.
The program pays an average of $722 per month to 4.7 million beneficiaries
and 1.6 million members of their families.
The change will affect only the application process for Supplemental Security
Income, or SSI, which aids poor people with disabilities. Applicants may earn
up to $700 a month and still qualify. But the program, which is based on
income, already reduces benefits by $1 for every $2 earned above $65, and
that will not change.
Each year, nearly 400,000 people collecting disability benefits work in some
way, but many others do not try for fear of losing cash and medical benefits,
advocates say.
The change does not affect workers who are blind. They already may earn
$1,110 per month - a figure set in legislation and which rises with inflation
each year.
A spokesman for the program, John Trollinger, said that more than 3,000
public comments, an unusually higher number, were received about the proposed
change. Only one person opposed the change.
AP-NY-06-30-99 1752EDT
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