3 key changes will help poor qualify for more money through a Social Security program

People living in poverty soon will see a series of barriers, which involve such things as food, removed for qualifying for one Social Security Administration program.

The agency is simplifying and expanding its policies for Supplemental Security Income benefits for those with little or no income and very limited resources.

Beginning Monday, an applicant or recipient of SSI would not be turned down for benefits or see reduced benefits based on any informal food assistance that the person might receive from friends, family, and community networks. The agency is no longer going to be including food as part of what it calls In-Kind Support and Maintenance calculations.

The change represents a decent boost for those receiving SSI benefits . The agency estimates that monthly SSI payments would go up by about $131 per month for more than 90,000 people. The change would also allow more people to qualify for benefits.

"SSI is a program for the poorest of the poor," Commissioner Martin O’Malley said in an interview Friday with the Detroit Free Press. The program dates to the 1970s to provide monthly cash assistance to disabled or older people who have little income and few assets.

"It is an income-based program, and you have to be very, very low income to qualify," O'Malley said.

Some 248,300 people received SSI benefits in Michigan, including 31,576 children and teens under age 18 as of December 2023.

Social Security notes online that SSI is generally for individuals who don’t earn more than $1,971 from work each month.

"The income limit increases for couples and when parents apply for children. We also look at other sources of income besides your job, like disability benefits, unemployment, and pensions," according to the Social Security Administration. An online calculator gives some eligibility guidelines at www.ssa.gov/ssi/eligibility for who can get assistance.

The maximum monthly SSI benefit in 2024 is $943 for an individual and $1,415 for a couple. Some people receive less than that maximum based on their income, the income of certain family members, their living situation, and other factors.

"It's a lifeline to millions of Americans," O'Malley said. "And we just made regulatory changes that made it better for all of those beneficiaries and made it possible for many others who could be helped who in the past did not apply for the program."

These new regulations, he said, will no longer reduce your benefits by the amount of food you might be given in kind in the house where you live.

The goal has been to simplify SSI, he said, including the administration of the program. The upcoming changes, he said, will smooth the process.

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"We want people to be able to work. We want people to be able to sustain themselves. But programs that have income limits, as indeed SSI does, you work your way out of eligibility for the program in a pretty abrupt way," O'Malley said.

"The advocates for people that work in this space are very, very glad that we are no longer going to count against your benefits food that you may receive if you live with another person or in a family," O'Malley said.

Such measures, he said, can also add to the administrative burdens.

"It puts our service reps, our technicians, our agents in the field offices, it puts them in the position of having to be food, rent and living arrangement detectives in order to administer the program," he said.

A second change involves rent. Beginning Monday, the agency is expanding a complex rental subsidy exception to all SSI applicants and recipients nationwide that previously applied in only seven states. The policy had previously applied in Connecticut, New York, Vermont, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Texas.

It’s estimated, according to the agency, this change could increase monthly SSI payments by about $132 per month for about 41,000 people and allow more people to qualify for SSI.

A third change involves nutrition assistance. Beginning Monday, the agency will add Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP benefits to the types of public assistance listed in the policy. As a result, the agency will no longer require that all household members who receive public assistance to be considered a public assistance household when it comes to applying for SSI benefits.

The expanded definition involving public assistance will allow more people to qualify for SSI, increase some monthly payment amounts, and reduce reporting burdens for those living in public assistance households. It's expected that some 277,000 people could benefit from increased payments.

If someone is determined to be living in a public assistance household, the agency will assume they are not receiving assistance from other household members that would otherwise be counted as income. By making this key change, more people will qualify for SSI and in some cases, receive a higher SSI payment.

SSI benefits apply to adults and children with a disability or blindness, and to adults age 65 and older, who have limited income and resources. The benefits help pay for basic needs like rent, food, clothing, and medicine. People applying for and receiving SSI must meet eligibility requirements, including income and resource limits.

Contact personal finance columnist Susan Tompor: stompor@freepress.com . Follow her on X (Twitter) @ tompor .

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: 3 key changes will help poor qualify for more money through a Social Security program