The campaign, led by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP), has grown as it enters its 76th year, and now includes initiatives by employers, advocates, and others. While the campaign has made progress, the march toward greater employment opportunities has lagged considerably. In many countries, the unemployment rate among people with disabilities is 80 percent or higher. The novel coronavirus pandemic has also disproportionately impacted workers with disabilities, including in the United States.
With an estimated 1 billion people worldwide living with a disability—and potentially even more due to aging and long-COVID challenges—limiting the commemoration to only the United States fails to recognize the global disability community, their contributions and challenges they face. To better represent everyone, we are dropping “National” from the official title and will refer to the campaign as Disability Employment Awareness Month (DEAM).
At InclusionHub, we plan to make the most of this year’s celebration with dedicated DEAM-related content一starting with background on the campaign, and information about the work being done supporting its goals.
This year’s DEAM theme is “America’s Recovery: Powered by Inclusion,” underscoring the important role the disabled community can play in the economy’s rebound from the disruption caused by the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
While there’s been significant progress made in addressing physical obstacles, digital access is foundational to the idea of inclusion and serves as our inspiration at InclusionHub. For those who are unfamiliar, InclusionHub is an online digital accessibility resource for educating and informing those who work to improve digital inclusion.
Our InclusionHub co-founding partners, Salesforce and Be My Eyes, approach this mission in meaningful and complementary ways. Salesforce, the leading customer relationship management (CRM) provider in the world, is committed to developing accessible workplace products for all, and its Accessibility Support Team provides assistance in building accessible environments in the current Salesforce ecosystem.
Be My Eyes, a 2021 Apple Design Award winner, provides a first-of-its-kind mobile-enabled platform for sighted people to assist blind and low vision users with everyday tasks. Be My Eyes boasts more than 5 million volunteers and 300,00-plus blind and low vision users.
Together, we collaborate to make the web, applications, and other technologies accessible to everyone.
For additional suggestions to commemorate DEAM 2021, visit the Campaign for Disability Employment.
The origins of DEAM date back to 1945 when returning World War II service members raised the visibility of people with disabilities and their struggles to access gainful employment. In particular, disabled veterans advocated for increased rehabilitation and vocational training to better prepare for the domestic workforce.
That same year, Congress enacted Public Law 176, declaring the first week of October “National Employ the Physically Handicapped Week.” In 1962, the word “Physically” was removed in recognition of a broader definition of “Handicapped” beyond only physical differences.
Eventually, the greater disability movement began making progress in challenging stereotypes about the community and advocating for more civil rights. The early 1970s saw the passage of Sections 504 and 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, prohibiting recipients of federal funds from discriminating against people with disabilities. Subsequent amendments clarified and expanded the law’s coverage of digital accessibility.
In 1988, Congress extended the disability employment observance to a month and renamed it as “National Disability Employment Awareness Month.”
In 1990, the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act codified civil rights for the disabled community, ensuring access to employment, government, public establishments, transportation, and communication.
The legislation moved the needle for the integration of people with disabilities throughout society, leading to structural improvements to the physical world and expanded access to information, education, and entertainment opportunities.
Access to employment opportunities, however, lagged behind一and has yet to catch up.
According to the National Council on Disability’s (NCD) most recent employment report, more than 60 percent of working-age Americans with disabilities are unemployed. Furthermore, those who are seeking work suffer an unemployment rate twice that of their non-disabled counterparts一this despite additional legislative gains since the passage of the ADA and billions spent on federal programs focused on moving the disabled community into the workforce.
Clearly, systemic change is needed in our institutions and incentive structures to better support people with disabilities.
While there is still much work to be done, recent shifts to remote working environments, flexible scheduling, and increased computing have demonstrated that the work-from-home model is viable. While the adjustment to remote access has been mixed, some workers with disabilities have found value in working from home and enjoy not having the pressures of commuting and other societal obstacles.