Effective January 1957, monthly benefits have been payable from the OASI Trust Fund to disabled children aged 18 and over of retired and deceased workers in those cases for which the
disability began before age 18. The age before which disability is required to have begun was subsequently changed to age 22. Effective February 1968, reduced monthly benefits have been payable from this trust fund to disabled widows and widowers at ages 50 and over. Effective January 1991, the requirements for the disability of the widow or widower were made less restrictive.
On December 31, 2007, about 850,000 persons were receiving monthly benefits from the OASI Trust Fund because of their disabilities or the disabilities of children. This total includes 25,000 mothers and fathers (wives or husbands under age 65 of
retired-worker beneficiaries and widows or widowers of deceased insured workers) who met all other qualifying requirements and were receiving unreduced benefits solely because they had disabled-child beneficiaries (or disabled children aged 16 or 17) in their care. Benefits paid from this trust fund to the persons described above totaled $7,293 million in calendar year 2007. Table
VI.G1 shows these and similar figures for selected calendar years during 1960-2007, and estimated experience for 2008-17 based on the intermediate set of
assumptions.
