Article from Forbes Magazine, by Susan Adams
Photo from Forbes Magazine
In the United States, as of March 2014, a 1973 federal law designed to protect disabled people from job discrimination got additional teeth, prompting companies to be more proactive about hiring people with physical or mental challenges. The “Final Rule” of Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 requires all government agencies, all companies with federal contracts and any company that has a business relationship with a company that gets money from the federal government, to strive for a workforce which is at least 7% made up of people with disabilities. If an employer fails to meet the goal, he is expected to assess his hiring practices and his outreach efforts toward people with disabilities and take steps to improve them. As of September the unemployment rate for people with disabilities was 12.3% compared to 5.9% for the general population.
The new regulation prompted Tony Lee, publisher of CareerCast, a job listing and advice website run by classified advertising software maker Adicio, to put together a list of best jobs for people with disabilities. The jobs on the list aren’t ranked. Rather they are a sampling of some of the best jobs that people with disabilities are likely to get and perform with relative ease, according to Lee. These jobs also pay well and the outlook for growth is high, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
