The consumption of social security and welfare services among young adults has been a controversial topic in Norway, both academically and politically, for a number of years. In 2013, there were more than 5,200 individuals (1.7%) within the age range of 25 to 29 years who received disability benefits. The objective of this paper is to investigate the risk of becoming dependent on social security benefits among young people with special educational needs, a segment of the population that often is considered to be at risk of maladjustment in adult life. In Norway more than 95% of those completing the compulsory lower secondary school proceed to upper secondary education, nearly a tenth of them with special adapted teaching. Students who began upper secondary education with special needs in the mid-1990s have been followed prospectively in the present study for more than ten years. In their late twenties more than one third of them are social security recipients. The analysis focuses on psychosocial difficulties, functional level, and school variables that affect adaptation to social security among former students with special educational needs in their late twenties.