When you file for Social Security Disability benefits, one of the factors considered by the Social Security Administration’s Social Security Disability adjudicators in assessing whether you are capable of doing employment is your transferability of abilities. Essentially, they will examine all of the talents you possess as a result of your schooling or previous life or work experiences to determine whether those skills qualify you for any type of work offered on a national level (thus disqualifying you from Social Security Disability Benefits).
Each profession that you perform demands a specific set of talents. These abilities might be very straightforward and quickly acquired, or they can be extremely difficult and require years of study or training to perfect. Similarly, job skills may demand manual labor, fine motor abilities, or the capacity to manage others. Whatever you did in previous jobs and whatever talents you acquired via your school will be assessed for transferability of skills.
When considering your transferability of abilities, the Social Security Handicap system will also consider your age and the impact your disability may have on your ability to continue using the skills you have acquired.
In general, the older you get, the less adaptability is required of you in terms of skill transfer. If you are approaching retirement age, Social Security Disability programs do not anticipate much adaptation in terms of the skills and resources required. If you are over 60, the Social Security Administration will normally consider your transferability of skills only for positions that are extremely comparable to what you have already done and require little, if any, retraining.
If you are in your fifties, Social Security Disability adjudicators and vocational specialists anticipate that you will be able to handle some retraining, as long as the skills involved are transferrable. The SSA will not ask you to transition into a career for which you have received no training, but it may expect you to adjust to new tools and methods in a related profession. Individuals under the age of 50 will normally be expected to retrain and adapt to any job for which they are physically and educationally capable, regardless of whether the job requires little or no transferable skills.