United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

Chicago, Illinois 60604

Argued April 27, 2021 

Decided May 27, 2021 

Before 

DIANE S. SYKES, Chief Judge

FRANK H. EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge

MICHAEL Y. SCUDDER, Circuit Judge

No. 20-1899 

DEANA COYIER,

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

v. 

ANDREW M. SAUL, 

Commissioner of Social Security,

Defendant-Appellee.

Appeal from the 

United States District Court for the 

Western District of Wisconsin. 

No. 19-cv-393-bbc

Barbara B. Crabb,

Judge.

O R D E R

Deana Coyier appealed the denial of her application for Social Security disability 

benefits. She argues that the administrative law judge failed to assess the reliability of 

the vocational expert’s estimate of suitable jobs available for her in the national 

economy. The ALJ gave Coyier’s counsel an opportunity to develop his argument about 

the reliability of the estimates in a posthearing brief and held the record open 

specifically for that purpose. Counsel submitted nothing. Counsel’s failure to avail 

himself of the opportunity to develop an argument about the expert’s estimates is a 

waiver, so we affirm.

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1
No. 20-1899 Page 2 

In 2017 Coyier, then 38, applied for benefits, asserting that she could no longer 

work because of several psychological conditions that make it difficult for her to 

interact with people and cope with change.1 Coyier has been in and out of therapy 

throughout her adult life. She has been treated for suicidal ideations, self-harm, 

debilitating panic attacks, aggression, and social phobia, and takes numerous

psychotropic and anxiolytic medications. The Social Security Administration denied 

Coyier’s claims initially and on reconsideration. 

At an August 2018 hearing, a vocational expert (“VE”) testified that someone 

with Coyier’s education and impairments would be capable of medium-exertion work

and that a significant number of suitable jobs existed in the national economy, including 

industrial cleaner (469,000 jobs), laundry laborer (79,600 jobs), and stuffer (42,800 jobs). 

20 C.F.R. § 404.1566(b). Coyier objected generally to the VE’s methodology for 

calculating the number of available jobs, known as the “equal distribution method,” 

which assumes that all job titles within a particular job group listed in the Dictionary of 

Occupational Titles exist in equal numbers in the national economy. In support Coyier 

cited our decision in Chavez v. Berryhill, 895 F.3d 962, 970 (7th Cir. 2018)—published two 

weeks before the hearing—and asserted that according to Chavez, the equal-distribution 

method “does not necessarily qualify as a recognized or appropriate source of [job] 

numbers.” The ALJ deferred ruling on the objection, invited supplemental briefing, and 

offered to hold a second hearing. She kept the record open for an additional week, but 

Coyier’s attorney did not submit anything further.

In September the ALJ ruled that Coyier was not disabled. Applying the five-step 

analysis set forth in 20 C.F.R. §§ 404.1520(a)(4), 416.920(a)(4), the ALJ determined that 

Coyier had not worked within the claim period (step one); that her psychological 

impairments were severe (step two) but did not presumptively establish a disability

(step three); and that she retained the residual functional capacity to perform work at all 

exertional levels with limitations on task complexity and social contact (step four). For 

the fifth and decisive step, the ALJ relied on the VE’s testimony and determined that 

Coyier could perform the work of industrial cleaner, laundry laborer, or stuffer, and 

that hundreds of thousands of these jobs exist in the national economy. The ALJ also 

concluded that Chavez had not invalidated the equal-distribution method and that the 

VE’s job numbers were both “reliable” and “uncontested by any specific objections.”

1 She also cited several physical conditions but they are not relevant to her 

appeal.
No. 20-1899 Page 3 

The Appeals Council denied Coyier’s request for review, so she sought judicial 

review. Coyier does not dispute the ALJ’s determination that she has the residual 

functional capacity to perform a full range of work at all exertional levels if she is 

limited to occasional interactions with workplace supervisors and the general public. 

She argues only that the ALJ “made no attempt to determine the basis for the [VE’s] 

numbers or the reliability of the numbers.” The district court affirmed the ALJ’s

decision and concluded that the ALJ properly relied on the VE’s testimony about job 

numbers, which Coyier’s “blanket objection” and limited cross-examination had not 

called into question. 

On appeal Coyier argues that at step five a claimant needs to object only to some 

aspect of the expert’s method used to arrive at his job-number estimate to trigger the 

ALJ’s duty to ensure the reliability of the VE’s methodology. She claims that the ALJ 

erred by not scrutinizing the VE’s methodology. However, Coyier waived any 

challenge to the VE’s testimony by failing to ask any questions to reveal shortcomings 

in the job-number estimates or to submit a supplemental brief on the issue despite 

assuring the court prior to and at the hearing that he would do so. These omissions 

effectively conceded the reliability of the VE’s job numbers. Biestek v. Berryhill, 139 S. Ct. 

1148, 1156–57 (2019); see also Donahue v. Barnhart, 279 F.3d 441, 446 (7th Cir. 2002) 

(“When no one questions the [VE’s] foundation or reasoning, an ALJ is entitled to 

accept the [VE’s] conclusion ... .”). 

In Chavez the claimant made repeated objections to the VE’s job-number 

estimates and “asked the VE how he had arrived at [those] figures.” 895 F.3d at 966; see 

also Brace v. Saul, 970 F.3d 818, 820–21 (7th Cir. 2020) (The claimant objected to the VE’s 

job numbers based on Alaura v. Colvin, 797 F.3d 503, 507–08 (7th Cir. 2015), and then 

“asked the [VE] to explain his methodology.”). Here, in contrast, Coyier’s counsel made 

no additional arguments beyond the general objection and asked no specific questions

of the VE concerning the job-number estimates. Because counsel failed to develop an 

argument or question the VE any further about his methodology, the ALJ was entitled 

to rely on the job-number estimates. Barrett v. Barnhart, 355 F.3d 1065, 1067 (7th Cir. 

2004).

We note for completeness that Chavez did not enjoin the use of the equaldistribution method and created “no new obligations” at step five; the substantialevidence standard still governs. 895 F.3d at 970. Based on that standard, which “is not 

high,” Biestek, 139 S. Ct. at 1154, the ALJ was entitled to accept an expert’s testimony

that was uncontradicted and “otherwise proper,” Liskowitz v. Astrue, 559 F.3d 736, 745–
No. 20-1899 Page 4 

46 (7th Cir. 2009); see Surprise v. Saul, 968 F.3d 658, 662 (7th Cir. 2020) (explaining that an 

ALJ may properly accept a VE’s uncontradicted testimony absent obvious internal 

conflicts).

AFFIRMED