The Difference Between Private Disability and Social Security Disability Insurance

If something happens to you, especially at work, you might need disability insurance to pay for the bills that will pile up. You will also require that money to support yourself and your family if it turns out you cannot return to work at the job you once held. Perhaps you can get another job within that same field, but you won’t be able to retain the position that was once your first choice.

You can collect social security-based individual insurance, and it can certainly help you. However, there is also private, personal, long-term disability insurance. These two insurance varieties are similar in some ways but distinctly different in others. We’ll talk about both of them now.

Social Security Disability Insurance

To better understand the difference between social security and private individual insurance, we’ll first explain what each one means. Social security disability payments come into play if you hurt yourself, and you can prove you can no longer do the kind of work you once did.

There are all kinds of ways that might happen. You might fall off a scaffolding while working construction. You could suffer severe burns while working as a firefighter. There are thousands of other scenarios where an injury or illness will prevent you from working like you once could.

You can learn more about disability benefits in Connecticut and the eligibility criteria. But there are some things to keep in mind about social security disability insurance. For one, it’s a government-managed program, and they will only pay out if you worked enough of your adult life to become eligible for it.

Social security disability is a federally-created program that has existed for many decades. You must pay into it from your paycheck each week, month, or whenever your company pays you.

This fund exists to cover you if you hurt yourself in one of the ways we’ve described. You must meet two qualifications if you’re going to be able to collect this money every month, though.

First, you must have worked for long enough in your adult life to qualify. Second, you must meet the program’s criteria of what “disabled” means.

What About Private Disability Insurance Policies?

A private disability insurance program is one that you pay into that the federal government does not run. A private insurance company offers you this policy, and it is entirely your prerogative whether you want to pay into it or not.

Though it’s not necessary to purchase one of these programs, it’s a smart thing to do. If you work doing a relatively dangerous job, such as if you’re a cop, firefighter, etc., you should certainly get one of these policies if at all possible.

How Are They Similar?

The real similarity between federally mandated social security disability and the private kind is that you must prove your disability to get money from either one or both.

Either the government or the private insurance company will want to know a great deal about what happened and your mental and physical condition afterward. They will only pay you the money you feel you are due if you can convince them you’re legitimately sick or injured.

As you might imagine, fraud abounds, so both the government and private companies might be leery about paying you this money. They may not believe you.

You might need several doctors concluding the same thing for you to get that money, namely, that you can no longer work like you once could. Private insurance companies sometimes even hire investigators to watch you to make sure you’re not faking the injury or illness to collect that money from them.

Should You Get Private Disability Insurance?

If you work for years as an adult, putting in forty-hour work weeks, or close to that, you should automatically pay into social security, which you will collect when you retire. You are also automatically paying into a social security disability fund, though.

If you injure yourself while at your job or get sick to the point that you cannot return, you should be able to collect that money. However, it’s not like that fund will yield millions of dollars every month to you.

Getting a disability policy with a private company is wise since that can supplement the money the federal government gives you. You should consider it even more carefully if you have a family. You know the meager amount you’ll get from the government won’t be enough to cover your medical bills, to say nothing of food, rent, the mortgage payment, utility bills, and so forth.

When you think of it like this, it’s easy to see why you should have both federal social security disability and a private policy waiting in the wings in case disaster strikes.