Indicator: 67 - Employment Rates of the Disabled

Why This Is Important

This is an important indicator because a strong economy requires the contributions that we ALL have to offer. If a class of people is under-represented in the labor force, the economy is missing out on valuable skills, abilities, and assets of some of our people. This indicator does not consider people whose disabilities actually prevent them from being able to work, but only those who are in the labor force. For these purposes, someone with a disability is defined as having a work limitation of some sort, including having been out of work for six of the previous twelve months due to disability. Although this indicator focuses on people with disabilities who are in the labor force, there is a significant number of people with disabilities who are not in the labor force, and many who have dropped out of the labor force because of the difficulties they face in gaining meaningful and rewarding employment.

Where We Stand

In 2000, 42% of non-institutionalized people with disabilities in Maine were employed. In the same demographic group in the United States, only 32.8% were employed in that year.

Data Sources and Context

The data comes from the Maine Economic Growth Council’s Measures of Growth 2003; summary and analysis of data for that publication is done by the Maine Development Foundation. For this measure, the Foundation analyzed data based on a report by Cornell University’s Rehabilitation Research and Training Center for Economic Research on Employment Policy for People with Disabilities, 2001. Measures of Growth 2003 is available on-line at http://mdf.org/megc.