A thought came to mind today as I continued with yet another day of job hunting: Why is it that the unemployment rate within the disability community is so high? It’s 80%. We can do the exact same work as able-bodied people, but may need the occasional accommodation (after all, that’s what being an “Equal Opportunity Employer” is all about, isn’t it?).
However, I also equated it to the current trend where some positions are being taken over by robots, or machines, or AI: Why hire people to do the job when a machine can do it much faster? That’s probably what some employers see when they come across an applicant with a disability: Why hire this person over Joe Schmoe, who can do the same job probably in a shorter amount of time, and won’t need accommodations?
We’re willing to work. But it’s at least twenty times harder to land a job. I feel as though the stigma around people with disabilities — not just in the workplace, but overall — is still very prevalent. Just last night I was telling a good friend of mine how it wasn’t all that long ago that students with disabilities were educated in basements, or completely separate buildings, shut away from their able-bodied peers. This was in the early ’70s; what would later be known as the IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act) would be passed in 1973, under the acronym EHA (Education for All Handicapped Children Act).
The Americans with Disabilities Act was passed in 1990. It’s currently 2019, and this country (as well as the world) still has a long way to go.
Sure, this isn’t the case for everyone. I know plenty of people with disabilities who are well employed. But there are also the others who are un- or underemployed. State services designed to help us can only do so much (and, in my case at least, they’ve done nothing). I’m hoping that eventually we can move to be a world where there isn’t as much stigma around people who are percieved “different.” Look at us. Hear us. Hire us. We’re here, and we just want to be contributing members of society.