Daniele Rae Powley applied for disability insurance and supplemental security income benefits, alleging disability due to multiple sclerosis, Sjogren's syndrome, and other conditions. After a hearing before an Administrative Law Judge, the ALJ determined Powley could perform sedentary work and denied her claim based on the testimony of a vocational expert, who identified three job categories with tens of thousands of openings in the national economy. Powley submitted post-hearing objections with counter-evidence using the same SkillTRAN software and U.S. Census data, showing that the actual number of available jobs for those categories was negligible or non-existent. The ALJ dismissed this evidence without explanation, the Appeals Counsel denied review, and the district court affirmed the denial, reasoning that Powley failed to explain the methodology behind her numbers. The Ninth Circuit granted review to determine if the ALJ properly handled the conflicting job-number evidence.
The court applied the sequential evaluation process, specifically Step Five, which requires the ALJ to determine if significant numbers of jobs exist in the national economy. The panel relied on the rule from Wischmann v. Kijakazi, which mandates that if a claimant presents counter-evidence that is both significant and probative, the ALJ must address and resolve the inconsistency. The court found Powley's evidence probative because it utilized SkillTRAN and U.S. Census data, sources frequently relied upon by the SSA, and was supported by detailed reports explaining the methodology. The evidence was significant because the discrepancies were vast: the expert claimed 39,425 eyeglass assembler jobs while Powley's data showed 27, and 24,700 jewelry preparer jobs versus none. The court rejected the government's argument that the evidence was not probative because the claimant's attorney did not perfectly replicate the expert's methodology or possess specific expertise, noting that Kilpatrick and White established that such factors are relevant but not dispositive. The court held that the ALJ's brief statement that the expert's testimony was more persuasive due to his experience was insufficient to resolve the factual conflict in the data.
The decision reverses the denial of benefits and remands the case to the Social Security Administration. The agency must now conduct further proceedings to resolve the specific discrepancies between the vocational expert's job estimates and the claimant's data. This ruling reinforces the requirement for ALJs to provide specific explanations when rejecting claimant-submitted job-number evidence that uses reliable, agency-accepted methodologies, rather than relying on general deference to the expert's testimony.