Conflating the Stand/Walk Limitation to Eight Hours

A vocational witness responds to a hypothetical question that assumes a capacity for light work and a limitation to standing/walking for six hours in an eight hour day.  The claimant is advanced age, high school education, and past relevant work as a pharmacy technician (DOT 074.382-010, SVP 3, light).

The question did not contain any mental limitations but did have a limitation to occasional postural activities. The absence of a mental limitation, even slight or mild, made the case difficult. The limitation to occasional postural activities is unimportant. The vocational witness states that the person could perform past work as a pharmacy technician.

ATTY: What SOC code does pharmacy tech sort into?
VW: 29-2052 pharmacy technicians.
ATTY: What is your understanding of generally performed?
VW: [silence].
ATTY: Well, does it mean the majority of jobs, the median, the mean, what does generally performed mean to you?
VW: Generally performed as described by the DOT.
ATTY: What if we consider generally performed in the national economy. (that is the standard 20 C.F.R. § 416.960(b)(2)) If someone can only stand/walk six hours in an eight hour day, so that person must sit for two hours, can this individual perform work as a pharmacy tech as generally performed in the national economy?
VW: [mumbles, then silence.]

ATTY: If I presented you with data from the Department of Labor that reports jobs in this occupational group do not sit at the 25th percentile, do not sit at the median, and only sit for 1.1 hours at the mean, would that change your answer as to whether an individual could perform work as a pharmacy tech, as generally performed in the national economy, when that individual cannot stand/walk more than six hours in an eight hour day?

The vocational witness agreed that past work as a pharmacy tech requires more than six hours of standing/walking as actually and generally performed in the national economy.  Skills did not transfer to work that permitted six hours or less of standing/walking in an eight-hour day.  A colloquy ensued between the ALJ and counsel that "about six hours" of standing and/or walking found in the initial and reconsideration medical opinions/findings does not permit eight hours of combined standing/walking.  

In this case, counsel had submitted the Occupational Requirements Survey for Pharmacy Technicians (29-2052.00) from www.OccuCollect.com.  The ORS data and the vocational witness concession put the claimant into grid rule 202.06 once the claimant carried his burden of proof that he could not perform his past work as actually or as generally performed.  

Data wins.  Disabusing the witness of the notion that six hour of standing and/or walking does not mean six hours of each wins. 

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SUGGESTED CITATION:

Lawrence Rohlfing, Conflating the Stand/Walk Limitation to Eight Hours, California Social Security Attorney (May 11, 2020)
https://californiasocialsecurityattorney.blogspot.com/2020/05/conflating-standwalk-limitation-to.html