I am on disability do to my seizures. I have since I was a kid. If I marry another individual who is disabled child drawing off their parents I won’t lose my insurance or check. If I marry an able bodied person I lose my check and insurance please make it to where people who are on disability at no fault of their own can get married without losing any benefits . We need to be able to have benefits to marry because I will be losing 830 a month plus insurance which pays for my medication the Ssi and ssa is extremely tough to get. People just want to live their lifes without fear of the government coming in to take it for something as simple as getting married.
2 Likes
I fundementally agree with you. I have been in the disability rights movement for years and have seen disabled people get married and lose benefits. As an LGBT American I loved seeing gay marriage passed but due to the marriage penalty of SSI we do not have marriage equality for the disabled. We will never have marriage equality if disabled people cannot get married. Disabled people need the right to get married because it provides community innogration and prevents isolation caused by access barriers because we cannot access what other people can. Marriage is the foundation of western civilization and we can build strong families through marriage and make it easier for disabled people to adopt children, particularly disabled children which prevents more abortions because children have a place to go when they are born and be loved. In regards to the structure of ssi no body should have to choose between having benefits and having a family, this is why marriage rights are such a big issue. If you cannot provide for a family with your benefits it makes it hard to put your mark on the next generations. Religious freedom is one of the most important freedoms and if we don’t get rid of the marriage penalty we prevent practice of religion. I’m an orthodox Jew and not able to have any relations without marriage so we violate religious rights by SSI preventing marriage.
I wrote an essay on this issue here A Case For Repealing The Marriage Penalty for SSI | by Dylan Rothbein | Medium which may be extremely helpful.
1 Like