Evaluation of the Ticket to Work Program Initial Evaluation Report

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C.4 C. IDENTIFYING INDIVIDUALS WHO EARN A SUBMINIMUM WAGE The evaluation design assumes that most beneficiaries in this category will be working in sheltered workshops, but others might be working in competitive employment situations through a subminimum wage certificate. We anticipate that identifying these individuals will be very challenging, because SSA administrative data do not contain wage data. For SSI recipients, monthly earnings are available, but hours worked are not. Reports of annual earnings subject to FICA taxes are routinely reported, but again do not contain wage information and are only available after a 14-month time lag. The evaluation design proposes to develop a prediction equation for subminimum wages for beneficiaries with earnings, using detailed wage and hour data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation that have been matched to SSA’s administrative data. The resulting prediction model could subsequently be applied to the administrative data to predict the hourly wage rates for beneficiaries with earnings and begin to identify individuals who have a high probability of earning subminimum wages. Another option is to identify the similar group that has monthly earnings that fall well below what would be earned by a full-time worker who was paid the federal minimum wage. D. IDENTIFYING INDIVIDUALS WHO WORK AND RECEIVE PARTIAL CASH BENEFITS In any given month, many SSI recipients may be working and earning wages, even above the level designating substantial gainful activity, yet not sufficient to reduce their cash benefit to zero. 2 Because a Ticket holder must be in zero cash benefit status to generate an outcome payment for an EN, Congress was concerned that these individuals might have a particularly difficult time locating an EN willing to accept their Ticket and provide them the services necessary to increase their earnings and ultimately reduce their cash benefit to zero. Individuals who receive partial cash benefits can be identified through SSA administrative data. These individuals may actually be earning wages that might, in some situations, reduce their benefit to zero, yet continue to receive a benefit payment through the use of various work incentives (e.g. Plan for Achieving Self Support, subsidies, Student Earned Income Exclusion, etc.). In the next evaluation report, we will identify SSI beneficiaries who receive partial benefits because of work by focusing on their reported earnings during the prior 12 months. In particular, we will analyze those who have (1) some earnings in at least one month, and (2) earnings above the individual’s minimum disregard in one or more months. While the concept of partial cash benefits does not apply to DI-only beneficiaries on a monthly basis, on a longer term basis it does apply to those DI beneficiaries that have intermittent employment experiences that cause them to cycle in and out of payments during their Extended Period of Eligibility. Specifically, we will focus on DI beneficiaries that (1) receive FICA-covered earnings in a given year and (2) experience an interruption in benefit payments during at least one month of the year. We will also identify DI beneficiaries who 2 DI beneficiaries receive either the full cash benefit for which they are eligible or no payment at all. Appendix C: Defining the Four Adequacy of Incentive Groups
“work and receive full cash benefits,” defined as beneficiaries who intermittently use trial work period months, but do not enter the Extended Period of Eligibility. The data required to implement this definition are expected to be available in time for the evaluation’s next report in spring 2004 (see Chapter VIII). C.5 Appendix C: Defining the Four Adequacy of Incentive Groups
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Contract No.: 0600-03-60130 MPR Ref
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A CKNOWLEDGMENTS This report benefi
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C ONTENTS Chapter Page ACRONYMS ...
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vii Chapter Page V (continued) D. C
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A CRONYMS ABIL AIDS AWICs AOI BPAO
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E XECUTIVE S UMMARY T he Ticket to
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Overall, we found that SSA has impl
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money on their TTW operations. For
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xvii CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS SSA fa
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C HAPTER I O VERVIEW OF THE T ICKET
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The TTW program and other elements
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A. EVALUATION COMPONENTS: GOALS, SC
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7 ! How many beneficiaries particip
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9 B. PURPOSE AND ORGANIZATION OF TH
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C HAPTER II S TRUCTURE AND B ACKGRO
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In reality, however, the success of
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MAXIMUS to serve as the Program Man
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17 4. Participate in the activities
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N Decision Reversed Request SSA Rev
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21 c. Dispute Resolution In a progr
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Table II.1: Outcome-Only and Milest
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milestone payment is equal to 34 pe
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Unemployment Insurance (UI) wage da
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29 3. Related Initiatives TTW has n
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SSA Demonstrations. SSA plans to im
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Protection and Advocacy. The SSA-fu
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C HAPTER III TTW EARLY I MPLEMENTAT
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37 Table III.1: TTW Implementation
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Ticket-eligible beneficiaries were
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41 TTW. In the past, SSA systems ha
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information in SSA’s records cont
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work period automation and tracking
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Systems and Infrastructure. The Pro
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49 asked the Program Manager for a
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51 • The first payment for each b
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currently being addressed relate to
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payment system. Only one SVRA (Okla
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SVRA personnel have consistently ex
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59 • Are SVRAs permitted to requi
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Table III.4: ENs and ENs with Ticke
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Payment System. Many ENs do not bel
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example, reporting lags inherent in
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eceived only small amounts thus far
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SVRA services for Ticket clients; (
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C HAPTER IV E ARLY P ARTICIPATION P
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73 Figure IV.2: Cumulative Number o
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point in the Phase 1 rollout. For P
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77 Figure IV.7: First Assignments a
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79 Figure IV.8: Ticket Participatio
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81 Figure IV.10: Ticket Participati
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83 states. This finding suggests th
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There is a strong negative relation
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C HAPTER V C ASE S TUDIES OF E IGHT
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89 A. SERVICE MODELS AND TARGETED C
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Although the director was initially
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Clients who assign their Tickets to
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session. Those who miss their appoi
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interview. While this is time consu
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claim employer tax credits. Through
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these individuals, because they typ
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103 F. RELATIONS WITH OTHER ORGANIZ
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eneficiaries to meet that standard.
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IDR representatives said that to da
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substantiate wages, and clients are
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services? Unfortunately, for ENs to
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Manager. At present, this is only p
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stubs: the need for beneficiaries t
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C HAPTER VI A DEQUACY OF I NCENTIVE
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We have also begun to analyze admin
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viewed as lacking the productive ca
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assist in the identification of ind
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eneficiaries. In examining results
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127 E. CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS The
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C HAPTER VII C ONCLUSIONS AND I MPL
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noticeably low, and, among the very
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Act. At the same time, some ENs hav
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Another change requiring considerat
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C HAPTER VIII N EXT S TEPS FOR THE
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prior to September 2003 and had not
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R EFERENCES Adequacy of Incentives
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A PPENDIX A D ATA T ABLES C ORRESPO
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A-3 Table A.2 Cumulative Number of
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A-5 Table A.4 Percentage of Tickets
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Page 171 and 172: A-11 Table A.10 Ticket Participatio
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Page 177 and 178: A PPENDIX B P ROVIDER-SPECIFIC C AS
Page 179 and 180: informed beneficiaries that state V
Page 181 and 182: e considerably more successful if S
Page 183 and 184: them for employment. It was during
Page 185 and 186: working but are still receiving SSI
Page 187 and 188: B.11 client over a four-year period
Page 189 and 190: B.13 placing SSA beneficiaries than
Page 191 and 192: B.15 that came in for an initial ap
Page 193 and 194: B.17 all benefits; therefore, EES d
Page 195 and 196: B.19 outreach program. As noted pre
Page 197 and 198: B.21 remained employed. 3 Because o
Page 199 and 200: B.23 estimate of the financial loss
Page 201 and 202: B.25 Social Security benefits. IDR
Page 203 and 204: B.27 have to submit pay stubs twice
Page 205 and 206: B.29 Bridges still provides the 10-
Page 207 and 208: B.31 While she used to have a polic
Page 209 and 210: B.33 8. Oklahoma Department of Reha
Page 211 and 212: B.35 Beneficiaries interested in as
Page 213 and 214: B.37 permits agency budgets to be c
Page 215 and 216: A PPENDIX C D EFINING THE F OUR A D
Page 217: B. IDENTIFYING INDIVIDUALS WITH A N
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