There has been a lot of spotlight and controversy around the current U.S. administration’s rhetoric regarding Americans with disabilities. The rhetoric has not been kind, and there have been exaggerated claims about the causes and effects of developmental disabilities, particularly autism.
Actual policymaking has been a bit more nuanced.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced this month a new partnership between National Institutes of Health and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to collect and analyze health data with the goal of better understanding causes and effects of autism. As an academic, I am always in favor of more data and more scientific discovery.
Also this month, HHS committed to funding $1.1 billion in grants to provide services to older adults and persons with disabilities through the Administration for Community Living (ACL). This is welcome news for affected groups after last month’s announcement of staff reductions and a major restructuring of ACL.
In March, disability advocates spoke out against the Justice Department’s withdrawal of 11 pieces of guidance on implementation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). In the Department’s defense, though, 5 of the 11 were specific to the COVID-19 pandemic, and withdrawal of administrative guidance does not negate the statute itself. In fact, in the same breath, the Justice Department encouraged compliance with ADA, reminding businesses of tax incentives available to cover costs of improving access for employees and customers with disabilities.
I want to pause on the point of businesses accommodating employees with disabilities. First, the numbers.
Currently, 8% of non-institutionalized American civilians between the ages of 16 and 64 are living with a disability. However, only 4.3% of the labor force—those working or looking for work– within that age range are individuals with disabilities. The percent of working-age Americans with disabilities who are either employed or seeking employment is 41%, whereas the rate for non-disabled working-age Americans is 78%. And within the labor force of working-age Americans, 8.8% of participants with disabilities are unemployed (i.e. actively looking for work), while only 3.7% of non-disabled participants are unemployed.
A July 2021 supplement to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Current Population Survey allowed respondents who reported having disabilities to give more details on their labor market participation decisions. Those who were working age and either not in the labor force or unemployed reported several barriers to employment besides their own disability: lack of education or training, lack of job counseling, lack of transportation, loss of government assistance, need for special features at the job, and employer or coworker attitudes.
It is striking to me how many of those barriers could easily be removed by employers or communities if we more highly valued not only the humanity of our neighbors with disabilities but also their willingness and ability to contribute as employees.
They want to work. More than a quarter of unemployed working age Americans with a disability report having taken advantage of at least one career assistance program.
They can work. Among employed individuals of working age and with disabilities, 42.6% report no difficulty completing their work duties, and only 7.2% report severe difficulty.
Their work benefits us all. The AbilityOne Program is a federal program funding the employment of individuals who are blind or have significant disabilities. A 2023 study on the economic impact of AbilityOne found that every dollar spent on the program resulted in a $2.66 return to society. And, as icing on that cake, being employed cuts by more than half the likelihood that a working age American with disabilities will use financial assistance programs.
In my From the Murphy Center column in February, I wrote about the necessary and effective work of accommodating students with disabilities in America’s public schools. Especially when we do that work well, many individuals with disabilities are a promising source of untapped productive potential in the labor market. We can change that by removing barriers to their employment.
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Dr. Melissa Trussell is a professor in the School of Business and Public Management at College of Coastal Georgia who works with the college’s Reg Murphy Center for Economic and Policy Studies. Contact her at mtrussell@ccga.edu. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the College of Coastal Georgia.
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