ST. LOUIS — People with disabilities are a large potential talent pool for employers willing to reduce barriers in recruitment and on the job, according to research by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
The national unemployment rate for people with disabilities, 8.5% in November, is more than double the rate for all workers at 4.2%. People with a disability who are out of the labor force or unemployed total nearly 25 million, wrote two St. Louis Fed officials in a recent blog post. Data was not available for the St. Louis metro area from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“Employers can adopt numerous practices that may help them attract and retain workers with disabilities. Doing so would not only address labor shortages in the short term but also foster a more inclusive labor market,” wrote William Rodgers, director of the Institute for Economic Equity, and Data Scientist Lowell Ricketts.
Before the Americans with Disabilities Act became law in 1990, most hiring managers did not view people with disabilities as viable job candidates, wrote Colleen Starkloff, founder of the St. Louis-based Starkloff Disability Institute, and Centene Chairman and CEO Michael Neidorff. The ADA removed discrimination as a major barrier to employment. Businesses began to develop policies that balance the needs of individuals with disabilities and employers, Starkloff and Neidorff said.
“We became intentional about the design of accessible workplaces, as well as the creation of open and inclusive work cultures. There is no doubt that progress has been made toward a more accessible society, however, there is still much more for us to do,” they wrote in a Business Journal op-ed published in October.
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