People with disabilities continue to face extreme disparities in economic inclusion. They have lower employment rates, earn significantly less, are more likely to engage in precarious work, report barriers to receiving workplace accommodations, avoid disclosure of invisible and stigmatized identities, and are more likely to report discrimination than their non-marginalized counterparts. These challenges are heightened by and interrelated with other inequalities that marginalized populations experience such as higher rates of poverty and lack of access to education, housing, transportation, medical care, banking, and food. The COVID-19 pandemic has amplified the employment disparities between people with and without disabilities and within the non-monolithic disability community. Many people with disabilities experienced job losses, lower earnings, and challenges getting access to adequate social support. This chapter discusses barriers to economic inclusion of people with disabilities. In particular, it focuses on employment and financial inclusion as two key markers of larger economic empowerment. In helping to illuminate the many complex issues faced in the employment of persons with disabilities, this chapter aims to identify new and promising means to address barriers faced by people with disabilities. With increased partnership and collaboration, with the disability community leading this effort, the public and private sectors must seek to address the employment of persons with disabilities, which affects millions in the United States and around the world.

Many people with disabilities benefit from working at home, and the pandemic has increased employer acceptance of telework, but the current occupational distribution limits this potential. Tighter labor markets during the recovery offer hope that employers will increasingly hire people with disabilities in both telework and non-telework jobs.

Initial research indicates that paid sick leave mandates are linked to higher employment and lower unemployment, with the greatest effects on people with disabilities

The Build Back Better Act (H.R 5376) includes $5 billion to create and expand apprenticeship programs. This historic investment comes on the heels of over $950 million of federal grants targeted for this purpose in the last five years and a growing commitment among federal agencies, state governments, local policy makers, and employers to expand apprenticeship opportunities.

Given the training and experience of lawyers, we assumed that a study of lawyers’ willingness to disclose disability in the workplace would provide an example of the actions of a group knowledgeable about disability law. The current study accounts for the effect of visibility of disability, onset and type of disability, and whether the lawyer has made an accommodation request. We also investigate the role of other individual characteristics, such as sexual orientation, gender identity, race/ethnicity, age, and job-related characteristics, in willingness to disclose.

This article examines ways COVID-19 health surveillance and algorithmic decision-making ("ADM") are creating and exacerbating workplace inequalities that impact post-treatment cancer survivors. Cancer survivors' ability to exercise their right to work often is limited by prejudice and health concerns. While cancer survivors can ostensibly elect not to disclose to their employers when they are receiving treatments or if they have a history of treatment, the use of ADM increases the chances that employers will learn of their situation regardless of their preferences.

This chapter examines the prevalence, causes, and consequences of precarious work among people with disabilities. New US evidence from the government’s Current Population Survey, and reviews of prior studies, show that workers with disabilities are more likely than those without disabilities to be in precarious jobs.

Labor force exit due to disability is often preceded by a gradual decline in health. Frequent or increased rates of absence from work or presenteeism (working while sick) could serve as a signal that a worker has begun transitioning out of the labor force. We analyze the relationship between absences, presenteeism and work outcomes using data from the American Working Conditions Survey and the American Life Panel.

This paper studies the disparate effects of COVID-19 on workers with physical and mental disabilities, paying particular attention to an intersectional analysis by disability, race/ethnicity, and gender. Results indicate that White and Black women with disabilities experienced relatively greater employment losses during the pandemic compared to White men without disabilities.

Workplace accommodations, vital for employees with disabilities, promote diversity and inclusion efforts in organizations. This article examines who requests accommodations and who is more likely to have requests granted. We investigate the roles of individual characteristics and their intersection, including disability, sexual orientation, gender, race/ethnicity, and age.