I hear all the time that unemployment is high and the economy is in the toilet and able bodied people cannot find work. President Obama is allegedly creating jobs to help the unemployed. What I want to know is just what the hell has he done for people with disabilities to get them employed? The rate of unemployment is around 44% for people with general disabilities while reaching 70% for people who are visually impaired and blind. The numbers are hard to figure out as I found one that showed 16% unemployment for people with disabilities, however this number is taken from the number of people filing for unemployment in a one week period and not the total number of unemployed.
In my experience, looking for work is a pain, and getting past employer attitudes is a bigger pain. I have a dual masters degree to go along with my undergraduate degree and feel I am qualified for the positions for which I have applied. Employers like to hide behind what I call “Legal Discrimination”, which means that when they tell you that you did not get the job they use catchphrases such as: We are looking for someone who is a better fit, more experienced, more qualified; I was even told by one person that he hired the first person he interviewed. This is a crock! The jobs I applied for were mostly entry level, working in the state vocational rehabilitation area. So what is Obama going to do to help people with disabilities find gainful empl0yment?
I am waiting for the stimulus to help, and I don’t mean worthless job fairs where employers show up and make themselves appear to be willing to hire people with disabilities, but really are there to make themselves look good. I have never met a person with a disability that was hired at a job fair. Obama needs to open up government jobs and have more programs to get people who are visually impaired and other people with disabilities working in mainstream employment. Let’s get that stimulus money into jobs for the 16,000,000 people with disabilities who want to work.
Tags: Disabilities, disabled, employer, stimulus, umemployed, work
