## Facts

- Clifton Sykes, Sr. applied for Social Security Disability Insurance benefits after multiple work-related injuries.
- An Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) found Sykes had severe impairments, including blindness in his left eye, residual effects of a torn rotator cuff, angina, and obstructive pulmonary disease.
- The ALJ found Sykes could not perform his past relevant work.
- At step five, the ALJ concluded Sykes could perform “light” work and assumed that excluding jobs requiring binocular vision did not significantly reduce the light-work occupational base.
- The ALJ relied on the Medical–Vocational Guidelines (the “grids”) only as a framework, did not obtain vocational expert testimony or comparable vocational evidence, and did not provide notice of any intent to take official notice of vocational facts.
- The Social Security Administration denied benefits; the Appeals Council denied review; the district court affirmed; Sykes appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether, at step five, the Commissioner may deny benefits to a claimant with a nonexertional limitation by using the grids as a framework without producing vocational evidence or providing notice and an opportunity to respond before taking official notice that the limitation does not significantly erode the job base.
2. Whether the ALJ could assume, without evidentiary support, that monocular vision does not significantly erode the “light work” occupational base.

## Decision

- The Third Circuit vacated the district court’s judgment and remanded to the Commissioner for further proceedings.
- The court held the Commissioner may not meet the step-five burden by relying on the grids as a framework to find nonexertional limitations do not significantly erode the occupational base unless the Commissioner:
  - produces vocational evidence (e.g., vocational expert testimony or similar evidence), or
  - provides notice and an opportunity to respond and then properly takes official notice of vocational facts grounded in valid rulemaking or permissible case-specific procedures.
- Because the ALJ relied on an unsupported assumption about the vocational effect of Sykes’s monocular vision, the Commissioner failed to carry the step-five burden.

## Legal Principles

- At step five, the burden shifts to the Commissioner to show the claimant can perform jobs existing in significant numbers in the national economy.
- The grids primarily address exertional limitations; when nonexertional limitations may affect the occupational base, the grids alone generally do not resolve the vocational question.
- In the absence of an applicable rulemaking establishing the vocational effect of a specific nonexertional limitation, the Commissioner must support the step-five finding with vocational evidence or provide procedurally adequate notice and an opportunity to rebut any officially noticed vocational facts.
- An ALJ may not deny benefits based on unannounced, case-specific administrative notice of vocational conclusions about the effect of nonexertional impairments.

## Conclusion

The Third Circuit required the Commissioner, at step five, to support a denial involving potentially job-base-eroding nonexertional limitations with vocational evidence or procedurally proper official notice grounded in valid rulemaking; reliance on the grids as a framework and unsupported assumptions was insufficient, so the denial was vacated and remanded.


Sykes v. Apfel, 228 F.3d 259 (3d Cir. 2000)