New Video Success Story: From Disability Benefits to Benefits Counseling

A popular myth about working and receiving Social Security disability benefits is that you will immediately lose your cash benefits and Medicare or Medicaid if you work. This actually is not the case. Having a clear understanding of how work affects their cash and health care benefits can help people with disabilities start on the path to financial independence.

But how can you work and still have access to your benefits?

Social Security has Work Incentives that allow you to explore work options and still have access to your benefits when you need them.  These Work Incentives work hand in hand with the Ticket to Work program to support Social Security disability beneficiaries on their path to a financially independent future. In this Ticket to Work video, Michele shares her story. She used Work Incentives to help pay for her education and to continue to have access to her benefits if she needed them when working.  Her knowledge of Work Incentives led her to a job with AHEDD, an Employment Network (EN) working to provide employment services to people with disabilities, as a Community Work Incentives Coordinator.

Watch or read her story here.