The SSI Recipient Experience

Session Submission Type: Panel

Abstract

Over 7 million people in the United States rely on Supplemental Security Income (SSI) for monthly cash assistance, yet there is little qualitative research that centers SSI recipients’ experiences in their own words. Qualitative research is unique positioned not only to provide rich description of SSI recipients’ experiences and perceptions of the program, but also to detail how recipients navigate SSI’s strict policy rules that affect who SSI recipients can live with, how much they can work, and other aspects of their daily lives. 

In the first paper, Callie Freitag (University of Wisconsin-Madison) uses nationally representative interview data from the American Voices Project to describe the living situations of SSI recipients and ask about the extent to which SSI rules factor into SSI recipients’ descriptions of their living arrangements. In the second paper, Katie Savin (California State University-Sacramento) takes a community-engaged research approach to qualitative methods across two research sites in California and the Mid-Atlantic to ask SSI recipients (N=37) to better understand the factors that SSI recipients themselves perceive as most pertinent to their capacity to work and solicit recipients’ recommendations for policymakers. In the third paper, Matthew Borus (Binghamton University) draws on interview data conducted in the Chicago area in 2022 and 2023 (N=23) to ask how SSI and SSDI recipients understand their relationships to the programs and to the labor market, and the work they do to comply with complex rules to maintain their eligibility for benefits. Together, these papers offer insight into the small but growing body of research that asks SSI recipients to describe their experiences with the program in their own words.

Policy Area

• Poverty and Income Policy

Chair

• Lisa Klein Vogel, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Discussant

• Molly A Costanzo, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Organizer

• Callie Freitag, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Individual Presentations

• The Living Arrangements of SSI Recipients Across the Life Course - Presenting Author: Pooja Paode, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Non-Presenting Co-Author: Callie Freitag, University of Wisconsin-Madison

• “I’d Rather Work Than Get SSI” SSI Recipient Perspectives on Policy Barriers to Work - Presenting Author: Katie Savin, California State University, Sacramento

• Navigating Policy From Below: Managing on SSI and SSDI Before the Trump Administration - Presenting Author: Matthew Borus, Binghamton University (SUNY-Binghamton)