To evaluate a claimant’s work as generally performed in the national economy, locate
the occupational counterpart for the claimant’s job in the Dictionary of Occupational
Titles (DOT).
If there is no occupational counterpart in the DOT, you cannot evaluate past relevant
(PRW) as generally performed in the national economy unless you have evidence from
other reliable occupational information that provides this. For more information,
see SSR 00-4p.
NOTE: When evaluating PRW the claimant performed in the military, do not use a “civilian”
counterpart to a military job to conclude that the claimant could perform their past
relevant work “as generally performed in the national economy.” If the military occupation
is not defined in the DOT, the step 4 determination for these cases is an analysis
of the claimant’s ability to perform their military occupation as they performed the
job. The DOT does not provide information about the physical and mental demands of
all military occupations, so we are not always able to evaluate military occupations
as generally performed in the national economy unless we have evidence from other
reliable occupational information that provides this. Therefore, if the claimant’s
military occupation is not in the DOT and if the claimant is unable to perform their
military PRW as they describe it, proceed to step 5. At step 5 of sequential evaluation,
a claimant may be able to use skills they gained from skilled or semiskilled military
PRW to adjust to other work.