I always wonder what VA “Experts” have been smoking when they open their pieholes and start explaining SMC. The best one I’ve heard in recent memory is probably when our fellow 100%-rated Veteran and expert in all things VA, Combat Craig, attempted to sum up all the different flavors of higher levels of compensation created by Congress and how dangerous it can be to risk attempting it. 

The old Craigmeister avers SMC T is named after TBI. Well, close but no seegar, bubba. Congress is responsible for that one after about 79 years of SMC’s existence. Take a gander at 38 USC §1114 here and you’ll see how SMC T got its letter. Congress had already used up all the letters from A (indicating 10%) through S which is housebound in fact or 100% plus an additional 60% of separate and distinctly different disabilities apart from the 100% anchor rating. SMC S is like getting promoted from PFC to Corporal. It’s currently $446 more per month than a 100% total rating.

If they’d been more precise, SMC at the (s) rate would actually fall after 100% (SMC J in §1114) and before SMC L for loss of use, blindness, aid and attendance or bedridden. SMC K is just an outlier-kind of like supersizing a minor SMC disability. Maybe S was an afterthought. Who knows how them politicians think? They lost me when they said boys could start wearing falsies and use the girls’ bathrooms. But by throwing the S in at the end, it’s confused the bejesus out of millions of Veterans for the last 79 years and it gives Craig a great talking point about T even if it’s untrue. If they’d had any sense, Congress would have call it SMC R3 or maybe R2(a) and Craig wouldn’t come across like the village idiot. Here’s the video. I think it’s a bit dated based on the rates he’s quoting.

The next best whopper of a tale was where he says “SMC N and one half is meaningless.” According to VA’s little flow chart,  SMC N is $6,047 per month and SMC N½ is worth (in 2024 dollars) $6,390.95 (married). Unless my math is off, I see it as about $350 more than N.  I suspect the old Craigster  was trying to employ some of that fabled VA math. If he’s referring to what it takes to get to N½ makes it meaningless, then I’d allow he’s partially right. There’s sure not exactly a bunch of Vets running around without legs (sorry for the pun).

SMC N is pretty strict.  One of the most onerous in this parade of missing parts is you have to actually have your legs amputated off completely right up at the trunk of your body to qualify. None of that loss of use nonsense. Them legs gotta be gone with the wind, dude. Here’s the rest of the qualifiers. You can see it’s a pretty nasty list of missing or useless body parts.

§3.350(d):

Amputation is a prerequisite except for loss of use of both arms and blindness without light perception in both eyes. If a prosthesis cannot be worn at the present level of amputation but could be applied if there were a reamputation at a higher level, the requirements of this paragraph are not met; instead, consideration will be given to loss of natural elbow or knee action.

(1) Anatomical loss or loss of use of both arms at a level or with complications, preventing natural elbow action with prosthesis in place;

(2) Anatomical loss of both legs so near the hip as to prevent use of a prosthetic appliance;

(3) Anatomical loss of one arm so near the shoulder as to prevent use of a prosthetic appliance with anatomical loss of one leg so near the hip as to prevent use of a prosthetic appliance;

(4) Anatomical loss of both eyes or blindness without light perception in both eyes.

N½ is rare. Don’t get me wrong. It kicks in when you move into the wild combinations in SMC P like:

§3.350(f)(1)(xii)

Anatomical loss or loss of use of one arm at a level, or with complications, preventing natural elbow action with prosthesis in place with anatomical loss of one arm so near the shoulder as to prevent use of a prosthetic appliance, shall entitle to the rate between 38 U.S.C. 1114 (n) and (o). So, you can see you’d need to actually have one arm whacked off  right up to the shoulder and then have loss of use of the other. If you still had the forearm down to above the elbow, you’d be shit out of luck and only qualify for N.

VA doesn’t publish every possible combination of being blind, deaf and/or missing pieces and parts of extremities. In any event, you can be assured they’d screw it up and give you less than what you’re entitled to without a bunch of caterwauling. Besides, if they always did it correctly, I wouldn’t need to write about it.

One thing that made my jaw hit the ground was our newfound VA financial guru explaining an SMC example of a sample Veteran in possession of  SMC K, SMC L and SMC S and getting paid for all of them at once. Here’s “the raw numbers”. Add ’em up folks. K for $128.62, L for $4,506.84 and S for $4,054.12. Wowser. $8,689.58. Hooo, doggies. If only this were true, Craig. The problem, just like in the military, is when you get promoted from Private First Class to Corporal, you don’t get paid for both the PFC and the Corporal wages. You only get the higher one. Thus, you’ll have to subtract the $4054.12 from this faery tale to make it come true. So, from just what I’m showing you, it’s understandable if SMC confuses you, too.

Craig’s last admonition that “you don’t want to poke the bear and get reduced” sounds like it came out of the 1989 Disabled American Veterans playbook. Boy howdy if and when you get to 100% schedular, combined or TDIU and within striking distance of the higher SMCs, you sure don’t want to file for them and risk getting bushwhacked down to less than total. Jez. What kind of tripe is he selling?

Using this tidbit of information, does this mean if you have a raging case of Diabetes Mellitus II and winky quits working, you should forego applying for SMC K? Or if your peripheral vascular disease in the lower extremities becomes so egregious it requires amputation of your feet due to gangrene, you should refrain from filing for loss of extremities to avoid a reduction? Beware the Bear.

SMC is more complicated than piloting a sternwheeler up the Mississippi at night on a new moon. If you aren’t familiar with the river, you might want to avoid trying it. Sadly, VSOs are not taught this and most will deny there is such a thing. And then there’s Craig. He shouldn’t feel bad about his confusion. I’ve had attorneys from some of the Big name outfits try to explain how all this works and they’re just about as clueless. Shucks, The Paralyzed Veterans of America (PVA) sent us a spokesperson last Fall who purported to be an expert and he disremembered your legs have to be amputated at the body to get N.

I had an appeal back in ’17 where the Veterans Law Judge denied a Vet SMC L for loss of use of the bilateral lower extremities-all the while insisting the award of two SMC Ks (one for each foot) was correct in all respects. The best part of that was when the Court sent it back down to him after the JMPR, he had to chieu hoi and concede he was wrong. That would have been VLJ Mark Hindin. Dilly Dilly.

So, in closing, don’t feel pregnant and alone if all this makes your head spin. It has Craig pretty discombobulated too. It took me several years to wrap my head around every possible statute, regulation and interpretation of what the meaning of “is” is.  Shoot. Even the VA insists you can’t have two a&as. I’m sure Combat Craig means well. He just needs to go back to his fabled Boot Camp and hit them books.