NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
ROBERTA SHERRY KEIFER,

Plaintiff

- Appellant,

v. ANDREW M. SAUL, Commissioner of Social Security,
Defendant

- Appellee. No. 18

- 16019
D.C. No. 3:17

- cv - 00332

- EDL

MEMORANDUM *

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of California Elizabeth D. Laporte, Magistrate Judge, Presiding Argued and Submitted December 2, 2019 San Francisco, California
Before: LUCERO, ** CALLAHAN, and BADE, Circuit Judges. Roberta Keifer appeals the district court’s affirmance of the Commissioner of Social Security’s denial of Disability Insurance Benefits for the period between

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36

- 3.

** The Honorable Carlos F. Lucero, United States Circuit Judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, sitting by designation. 

# FILED

JAN 6 2020 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS2 18

- 16019

April 6, 2009 , and November 1, 2014

. Exercising jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we affirm.
We review de novo a district court’s affirmance of the decision of an Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ ”). Parra v. Astrue , 481 F.3d 742, 746 (9th Cir. 2007). A denial of benefits may be set aside only if “the ALJ’s findings are based on legal error or are not supported by substantial evidence in the record as a whole.” Id. ( quoting Tackett v. Apfel , 180 F.3d 1094, 1097 (9t h Cir. 1999) ). “Substantial evidence is such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion.” Id. Keifer challenges the ALJ’s failure to reconcile inconsistencies between the Department of Labor’s Dictionary of O ccupational Titles (“DOT”) and vocational expert (“VE”) testimony. The ALJ found Keifer’s residual functional capacity limited her to jobs involving one

- to two

- step instructions, meaning she was limited to DOT Reasoning Level 1 jobs. See D ictionary of O ccupational Titles app. C (4th ed. 1991) , 1 991 WL 688702 (defining Reasoning Level 1 occupations as those requiring employees to “[a]pply commonsense understanding to carry out simple one

- or two

- step instructions”). T he VE testified that Keifer could hav e worked as a n eye - drop per assembler (Reasoning Level 2), a stuffer (Reasoning Level 2), or a final assembler (Reasoning Level 1). Relying on the VE ’s testimony, the ALJ found Keifer could have worked in any of the se three3 18

- 16019

occupations , even though the occupations of eye - drop per assembler and stuffer require Level 2 Reasoning

. Although t he ALJ did not resolve this conflict between the VE ’s testimony and the DOT , we conclude any error was harmless. See Zavalin v. Colvin , 778 F.3d 842, 8 46 , 848 (9th Cir. 2015) (conducting harmless error review of ALJ’s failure to reconcile apparent conflict). The VE’s testimony was consistent with the
DOT w ith respect to the occupation of final assembler , and the ALJ found there

were a significant number of final assembler jobs

— 108,750 in the national
economy

— for which Keifer was qualified

. See Gutierrez v. Comm’r of Soc. Sec. , 740 F.3d 519, 529 (9th Cir. 2014) (holding 25,000 nationwide jobs significant).
Keifer also challenges the VE’s testimony as to job numbers. She did not raise this argument during the administrative hearing. “[W]hen a claimant fails entirely to challenge a [VE] ’s job numbers during administrative proceedings before the agency, the claiman t forfeits such a challenge on appeal, at least when that claimant is represented by counsel.” Shaibi v. Berryhill , 883 F.3d 1102, 1109 (9th Cir. 2017). Keifer was represented by a lay representative eligible for direct payment of fees under the Social S ecurity Act. W e conclude she forfeited any challenge to the VE’s job numbers because she failed to raise the issue during the administrative hearing. Even if Keifer’s argument were not forfeited, we would affirm. Keifer4 18

- 16019

contends that the ALJ unreasonably relied on the VE’s job

- numbers testimony without supporting data and that the testimony conflicts with the Occupational Outlook Handbook published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. But “an ALJ may rely on a [VE] ’s testimony concerning the number of rele vant jobs in the national economy, and need not inquire sua sponte into the foundation for the expert’s opinion.” Id. at 1110 ; see also Biestek v. Berryhill , 139 S. Ct. 1148, 1155

- 56 (2019) (“[A] vocational expert’s testimony may count as substantial evidence even when unaccompanied by supporting data.”). Because the ALJ’s findings were consistent with the VE’s testimony , the ALJ’s decision was supported by
substantial evidence in th e record.
AFFIRMED

.