HELLO FUTURE: Modernizing Disability Benefits: How AI Could Fix a Broken System

Kevin Cirilli sits down with Allsup CEO Jim Allsup to explore how cutting-edge AI tools—built around audio and video technology—are reshaping the Social Security disability process. Allsup explains how these innovations simplify a system that many disabled Americans find confusing and adversarial, and why Washington’s bureaucracy has failed to keep pace with medical and tech advances. The conversation underscores the need for conservative, common-sense reforms that restore efficiency, dignity, and real work incentives, including a fresh look at the Ticket to Work program.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Nowadays, it seems like artificial intelligence and technology. Everyone's talking
about these doom and gloom reports that it's going to
be the worst thing in the world and hurt people
and hurt underserved communities and hurt disadvantaged communities. And I'm
thinking to myself, I'm still an optimist. I'm still hopeful.
I think that it could actually have the reverse effect.

(00:30):
What if we deployed this technology to actually help to
actually make an impact on underserved communities. Hello, Future, It's
me Kevin. This is a dispatch from the Digital Frontier.
The year is twenty twenty five. The planet is Earth.
My name is Kevin SURRILLI, and today I'm talking about

(00:51):
social security and underserved individuals, folks with disabilities, folks who
haven't been dealt the easiest hand in life, and ways
of technology can and maybe make it just a little
bit easier. I'm thrilled to welcome to the program. First
time on the program, the founder and CEO of the
leading Social security Innovator. His name is Jim Alsop. Jim,
it is awesome to have you on this program. Where

(01:12):
are you broadcasting today from?

Speaker 2 (01:14):
I live in Scottsdale, Arizona. I'm on the side of
a mountain in Scottsdale Camelback east of Cammeblback.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
Okay, cause Scottsdale, Arizona is one of my favorite places
in the world. I have a phoenix tattoo, that's how
much I love that. There's something about the sky and
the air when you're in Arizona that I think is
really transformative to every single individual. So tell me about
how you got into your line of work and how
you're using technology, because I hear this is personal for you.

Speaker 2 (01:43):
When I was a kid, I was tired of going
to school. I did a shark sit in the military
that out and went to school in the olgivill Then
I got tired of going to school and I just
woke up one morning working in the Social Security system
at twenty four years old. I go, how did this happened?
Which I still don't know how it happened. But then

(02:04):
I decided, well, I'll do this for a while and
figure out what I really want to do later. So
I work there from twenty four to twenty nine years
old and left at twenty nine. Started at First of
a kind business about a year and a half later,
and the motivator for the business was my experience as
a kid working for the government, and what I observed

(02:26):
is the disability system and social security was and still
remains extremely abusive to the public. So I'm twenty four
years old working on that system, and immediately I think
to myself, what is this? So here you have a
program and you're dealing with these very vulnerable people with

(02:50):
legitimate disabilities, And the way I look at it, it was,
these are the people you should be helping the most,
and instead are governments system gives them a backhand. Not
all I do that, I not give them a hand up.
They give them a backhand because it's it's an extremely
abusive system. So this is what I observed when I

(03:10):
was there as a kid, and I left and then
started my initial business and grew it over the years.
And it's all about simplifying government complexity to make it
easy for the person.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
You've got artificial intelligence, this new technology, how are you
using it to simplify life to make it easier for
folks who have disabilities to get the benefits that are
so rightfully belonging to them.

Speaker 2 (03:35):
Well, or my staff is using artificial intelligence now to
try to meet up the application process. But before that.
For years, we've been using our own application system, which
is designed to make it very simple for people to use.
A person who has a disability today and wants to

(03:56):
file an application for Social Security disability benefits go to
a government website, it's impossible to use. So we develop
a system audio and video driven and it takes complicated
questions and very come down into simple questions. But it's
all audio and video driven to make it simple for

(04:17):
people to use, versus a government website where there is
no help and it's extremely complex, so they don't know
how to use it.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
Why is it important for audio and video for folks
with disabilities as opposed to just a complicated form.

Speaker 2 (04:29):
Because you need to make it simple for people to understand.
You've got a system that was designed intentionally to be difficult.
That's part of the reason why it's abusive. It's designed
to be difficult. So everything we do is simplifying the complex.

Speaker 1 (04:43):
And so when we talk about people with disabilities, can
you give us an example of the type of people
that are having to navigate through the system.

Speaker 2 (04:50):
Anybody with a disability that keeps them out of work
for a year, they can't can't go back and do
their work for at least a year. It can be
any tipular disability. And problem of it is you try
to use the government website, there is no assistance or
guidance whatsoever. Where our system is you have video and
audio guidance that's designed to make it simple for people
to use. But you get on the government side and

(05:12):
you sit there and you beat your brains out because
there is no assistance and it's designed to be difficult.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
Well, and you've got this. You've been a huge champion
of Tickets to Work. Correct.

Speaker 2 (05:20):
Yes, I was involved with the original hearings years ago
that led to the legislation and today we're the lead
provider and getting these sheepel back to work.

Speaker 1 (05:28):
So what is Tickets to Work? For people who aren't familiar.

Speaker 2 (05:30):
It's a program that people qualify for. So if they're
eligible for Social Security disability benefits, they're also eligible for
Ticket to Work, which provides assistance in getting them back
to work. Due to today's medical science, this program has changed,
so you have people that will qualify for benefits at
one point two or three years later they can go
back to work due to today's medical science.

Speaker 1 (05:53):
So walk me through that. Because this here we are
living through the Second Industrial Revolution. I believe the beginning
of the Second Industrial Revolution and the advances being made
in the medical world are truly profound, and I believe
you know. I don't want to project my religion onto anyone,
but I believe it's because of our faith that is

(06:13):
helping us to achieve that. I don't think these things
are at odds, but if you could help me personify it,
and I'm not asking you to break any hippo laws,
but explain to me an individual down to the disability,
just so people who aren't familiar with this, or who
have been blessed enough to not have to be familiar
with this, can really understand what the individual is going
for or going through rather and how the advances in

(06:37):
the medicine have shifted so much, which is a great thing.
But now the system is outdated because I just had
to meet the future moment, right the speed of recovery
in medical advances, that's a great thing, and we cover
that on this program. But the system is outdated, and
the system needs a meet the future moment where it's rebooted,

(06:59):
so to speak, to keep up with the science and innovation.
So give me a human example. I need a human,
concrete example. Jim.

Speaker 2 (07:07):
Well, the system is today, it needs to be simplified
and it needs to be much quicker. So right now
it's extremely complex and it also takes forever. So you
literally have people who die waiting to get their claims process.
Parents that you had things that used to last twenty years,
that might last five years, ten years, that might last

(07:30):
two years. They used to kill you, but now you survive.
And all of this has changed so much due today's
medical science that you have got a government system that's
still stuck in the past, but our medical science has accelerated.
So these people do qualify for benefits at one point,

(07:50):
which makes them eligible. But what happens is is with
the medical science today, two or three years later, they
can go back to work and that could apply to
any kind of disability. I mean, everything is different today
than what it used to be.

Speaker 1 (08:04):
Well, well, so are you optimistic that this is heading
in the right direction.

Speaker 2 (08:08):
Well, I'm in the middle of the thing, and I'm
going to do my part to make it to completely change.
I can tell you that. And what I'm focused on
right now is getting people back to work that have
the ability to go back to work. What's more important
is they want to go back to work. Yes, then
you've got a system that's designed to keep them from
going back to work, which is the crime of it all.

(08:30):
The issue is it has to be reformed so those
that qualify for benefits will get benefits quickly, but they
also get back to work quickly. So you can use
artificial intelligence to qualify them quickly, and you can use
the vocational assistance that we provide to get them back
to work quickly. So give you an example of the
reform that's necessary in today's world. The government system, there

(08:54):
is no distinguishing of the applicants. They deal with whether
they can go back to work with the few future
or whether they cannot. So when they go through the
government application process, the entire thing is prove to me
what you can't do, prove to me what you can't do.
In reality, that are growing for sideas of people twenty
percent up. At the time they apply for benefits, they

(09:16):
also know they're going to be able to go back
to work barring complications. So our application system, not the governments,
but our application system provides dual targeting and messaging for
both eligibility for benefits and to get you back to work,
such as verbiage I've built in for people that says,

(09:37):
we believe you're eligible for benefits for these reasons, but also,
barring complications, we believe you're going to be able to
go back to work. So we can do this to
qualify you for benefits, and we'll also do this to
get you back to work. We will do both.

Speaker 1 (09:52):
Jim also, we're going to have to lete it their
co founder and CEO of ALSOP, been the leading innovator
when it comes to a host of all of these
issues and everything. I appreciate you so much coming on
and if folks want to find you, I can go
to awesome dot com em see me Yes awesome. Thank
you so much and have a great day.