1

The Honorable Harold D. Vietor, United States District Judge

for the Southern District of Iowa.

___________

No. 95-3169

___________

Sonia Carlson, *

*

Appellant, * Appeal from the United States

* District Court for the

v. * Southern District of Iowa.

*

Shirley S. Chater, *

Commissioner of Social Security,*

*

Appellee. *

___________

 Submitted: January 12, 1996

 Filed: January 24, 1996 ___________

Before WOLLMAN, ROSS, and MURPHY, Circuit Judges. ___________

WOLLMAN, Circuit Judge.

Sonia Carlson appeals the district court's1 decision summarily

affirming the Administrative Law Judge's (ALJ) denial of her June

1992 application for disability-insurance benefits. We affirm.

I.

At the time of the hearing before the ALJ, Carlson was thirtyone years old. She has a high-school education and had previously

performed skilled work. On February 28, 1990, Carlson injured her

back at work and was diagnosed as having acute low back strain. At

the hearing, she testified to constant pain in the center of her

lower back and legs and numbness in her lower extremities.
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After finding Carlson incapable of returning to her past work

as a retail store manager, the ALJ shifted the burden of proof to

the Secretary to establish that a substantial number of jobs

existed in the national economy that realistically suited Carlson's

abilities. The ALJ found that the Secretary satisfied this burden.

II.

We limit our review to a determination of whether the

Secretary's decision is supported by substantial evidence on the

record as a whole. Mitchell v. Shalala, 25 F.3d 712, 714 (8th Cir.

1994).

In arguing for reversal, Carlson offers three theories.

First, she claims that the ALJ erred in relying on vocational

expert testimony inconsistent with the Dictionary of Occupational

Titles (DOT) and Social Security Ruling (SSR) 83-12. Second, she

urges that the ALJ incorrectly discounted her testimony and failed

to adequately analyze her husband's testimony. Finally, she

asserts that the Secretary erred in limiting the disability

analysis to the evidence of back strain, thus ignoring the new

evidence presented regarding disc herniation and stenosis.

The ALJ found that although Carlson could not lift more than

five pounds frequently and fifteen pounds occasionally, she could

perform the jobs of charge account clerk, telephone surveyor,

telephone quotation clerk, and order clerk in the food business.

The DOT classifies the job of telephone surveyor as light work and

the other three jobs as sedentary. Carlson alleges that the

finding that she can perform the job of telephone surveyor ignores

her inability to lift more than fifteen pounds, as the DOT defines

light work as requiring lifting up to twenty pounds. Our recent

decision in Jones v. Chater, No. 95-1904, slip op. (8th Cir. Dec.

18, 1995), is dispositive of this issue. In Jones we recognized

that a DOT definition of a particular job represents only the
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"approximate maximum requirements for each position, rather than

[the] range." Id. at 3. The vocational expert recognized this

fact in his testimony, noting that although most telephone surveyor

jobs were sedentary, some required light exertion, and further

noting Carlson's strength limitations. Accordingly, we find no

error.

Coupled with this claim is the additional assertion that the

ALJ ignored SSR 83-12, which, according to Carlson, provides that

unskilled job requirements preclude a person from sitting or

standing at will as Carlson's pain requires her to do. This claim

is based on an incomplete reading of SSR 83-12, which reads that

"in cases of unusual limitation of ability to sit or stand a

[vocational expert] should be consulted to clarify the implications

for the occupational base." As required by the ruling, the

vocational expert specifically took into account Carlson's need to

alternate positions when assessing what jobs she could perform.

Carlson's claim that the ALJ erred in discounting her

testimony and engaged in an inadequate analysis of her husband's

testimony are equally unpersuasive. Our review of the record

demonstrates that the ALJ engaged in a proper Polaski analysis, see

Polaski v. Heckler, 739 F.2d 1320 (8th Cir. 1984), in discounting

Carlson's testimony. Moreover, although the ALJ did not make a

specific credibility finding as to Carlson's husband's testimony,

he made an implicit finding after discussing the specifics of that

testimony. Although specific delineations of credibility findings

are preferable, an ALJ's "`arguable deficiency in opinion-writing

technique'" does not require us to set aside a finding that is

supported by substantial evidence. Robinson v. Sullivan, 956 F.2d

836, 841 (8th Cir. 1992) (quoting Benskin v. Bowen, 830 F.2d 878,

883 (8th Cir. 1987)).

Finally, Carlson points to the June 1994 medical tests that

showed her to have severe degenerative disc changes as new evidence
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of disability that the Appeals Council should have considered in

reviewing the ALJ's decision. The text of the council's decision

makes clear that it considered this new evidence and found the

ALJ's decision to be supported by the record as a whole, including

this newly submitted evidence. In these circumstances, remand for

further consideration is inappropriate. Riley v. Shalala, 18 F.3d

619, 622 (8th Cir. 1994).

After considering the record in its entirety, including the

new evidence, we find the ALJ's decision to be supported by

substantial evidence, and thus we affirm.

A true copy.

Attest:

CLERK, U. S. COURT OF APPEALS, EIGHTH CIRCUIT.