We live in a world of freedom. A world where every day new trends are being introduced and new rules are being made. We are now living in a world filled with revolution, and an era of transformation. Few times a year, we can see groups of women, men, and members of the LGBTQ+ communities marching on the streets of some of the major cities, protesting and demanding their rights from the Government of their respective countries.
Despite the intense protests that occur every year by some of the marginalized communities of our country, the rights of many are left unseen by the government officials and are oftentimes, swept under the rug. And the disability community falls under the category of individuals whose issues are often left unheard or are deemed “not important enough,” to discuss.
In our recent interview with the Governor of NHS Hospital and the Disability Rights Champion Kush Kanodia, he said, “We can focus on things such as the disability pay gap, doing accessibility audits of the physical environment, and the virtual environment. We can focus on co-design and co-production with lived experience service user groups and having disabled staff networks. So you start to have these feedback loops and discussions with organizations having a diversity of thought to grow, learn and develop. Because no organization is perfect.”
He further added, “But we need to have these conversations. We need to have these conversations now because it is not acceptable in this day and age for things not to be inclusive, and for people with disabilities to not be proportionally represented. In the disability rights movement, we have a mantra “Nothing About Us, Without Us,” this must be our guiding principle.”
Disability Pay Gap in the USA
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) has strictly prohibited any employer to discriminate against a qualified employee solely on the basis of his/her/their disability in terms of compensation or other terms, conditions, and privileges of their respective employment. Despite the strict rules of the prevention of discrimination against employees with disabilities, some researchers have found that the pay gap still is prevalent in our society even after 30 years of the law’s passage.
According to a 2014 report published by the American Institute of Research (AIR), the pay gap is still prevalent between individuals with and without any disability, and this gap has further surged with the increase of education attainment. Researchers at AIR also found that individuals with disabilities in the U.S who were of working age were paid 37% less than individuals without any disability.
Another analysis by the American Institute for Research, individuals with disabilities earns 64 cents less as compared to every dollar their colleagues without disabilities make.
A 2019 report by the U.S. Census Bureau, based on the analysis of the 2017 data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, revealed that full-time year-round American workers with disabilities earned 87 cents less than every dollar earned by a person without disabilities.
Disability Pay gap in the U.K
According to a 2020 report by the Trades Union Congress (TUC), the current pay gap for individuals with disabilities in the United Kingdom stands at a rate of 20%.
According to BBC news, employees with disabilities are paid 12.2% less than the employee without any disability. According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), the median pay for a worker with a disability was £10.63 an hour. Whereas, the median pay for employees without any disability was £12.11 an hour.
The ONS report further revealed that the widest disability pay gap was in London at a range of 15.3%, with the least disability pay gap in Scotland at a range of 8.3%. The report further revealed that the widest pay gap was for individuals with disabilities who were at an age range of 30-40 years old. This pay gap has been negatively impacting the lives of many people, and their families.
According to a poll conducted by TUC/GQR, individuals with disabilities were less likely to be able to afford daily basic necessities. The poll further revealed;
- 35% of employees with disabilities had to purchase minimal food for themselves and cut back on daily food intake, as compared to 18% of the employees who did not have any disability.
- 20% of employees with disabilities had delayed purchasing clothes for their children or families as compared to 12% of employees who did not have any disability
- 35% of the employees with disabilities had to live without heating during the winter season, as compared to 17% of the employees without any disability.
TUC further explains how the current government has done little to nothing for helping employed individuals with disabilities, including a failure to reduce the employment gap and a lack of action against the disability pay gap.
Why Is It Important to Dissipate Disability Pay Gap?
The answer is simple, every human being deserves to live their life conveniently without facing any discrimination irrespective of their race, ethnicity, gender, religion, or disability. An employee should not be devoided of his/her/their right to payment, benefits, terms, conditions, and privileges from their respective company just because they were born with a disability.
Another crucial reason why it is important to dissipate the disability pay gap of individuals with disabilities is because individuals with disabilities need a more cost of living to complete their additional expenditure for their personal services, transportation, healthcare, and accommodations.
Kush Kanodia told NuPrisma, “One thing I find very frustrating, from multinationals to the NHS, is that there is a basic misunderstanding of the law, which is that they think if we still treat everyone equally, we are treating everyone fairly. This is incorrect. Sometimes you have to make reasonable adjustments for people with disabilities to treat them fairly and equally because the current system is unequal.”
He further says, “There is a barrier to entry, and this is why I’ve been campaigning to transform the system. The sooner, I hope, people understand that, the better it will be for our whole society.”