Economic Impact on Disability and Employment

Economic Status and Disability

• Economic status of the community has a more profound impact than individual economic status on the probability of disability resulting from impairment or other disabling conditions.
• Persons with disabilities in communities with rapid economic expansion are more likely to secure jobs than those in communities with depressed or contracting labor markets.
• Wealthy communities are more able to provide environmental supports, such as accessible public transportation and public buildings, and support payments for personal assistance benefits.

Community and Disability

• Community can be defined in terms of the microsystem (local area), mesosystem (area beyond the immediate neighborhood), and macrosystem (region or nation).
• The economic status of the region or nation plays a more important role than the immediate microenvironment for certain kinds of disabling conditions.
• Access to employment among people with disabling conditions is determined by a combination of national and regional labor markets.

Economic Factors and Disability

• Economic factors can affect disability by creating incentives to define oneself as disabled.
• Disability compensation programs often pay nearly as much as many jobs available to people with disabling conditions, which can create disincentives to work.
• Disability compensation programs can reduce the number of people with impairments who work by creating incentives to leave the labor force and disincentives to return to work.

Political Factors and Disability

• The political system, through its role in designing public policy, can have a profound impact on the extent to which impairments and other potentially disabling conditions result in disability.
• The extent to which the built environment impedes people with disabling conditions is a function of public funds spent to make buildings and transportation systems accessible and public laws requiring the private sector to make these accommodations.
• The extent to which people with impairments and functional limitations will participate in the labor force is a function of the funds spent in training programs, healthcare financing, and job accommodations.

Disability and Social Environment

• Disability is not inherent in an individual but is a function of the interaction of the person with the social and physical environments.
• The amount of disability experienced by a person depends on both the existence of a potentially disabling condition and the environment in which the person lives.
• Human competencies interact with the environment in a dynamic reciprocal relationship that shapes performance.

Environmental Support and Disability

• Environmental support is necessary for social participation when functional limitations exist.
• The physical and social environments comprise factors external to the individual, including family, institutions, community, geography, and political climate.

Types of Environmental Support

• Communication aids: telephone amplifier, voice-activated computer, closed or real-time captioning, etc.
• Accessible structural elements: ramps, elevators, wide doors, safety bars, etc.
• Accessible features: built-up handles, voice-activated computer, automobile hand controls, etc.
• Job accommodations: simplification of tasks, flexible work hours, rest breaks, etc.
• Differential use of personnel: personal care assistants, note takers, secretaries, editors, etc.

Social and Psychological Environments and Disability

• The social environment is conceptualized to include cultural, political, and economic factors.
• Culture affects the enabling-disabling process at each stage and affects the transition from one stage to another.
• The psychological environment is the intrapersonal environment.
• Culture defines the roles to be played and the actions and capacities necessary to satisfy that role.
• Whether a functional limitation is seen as being disabling will depend on the culture.