People with disabilities maintained their exceptional labor force participation rate in the first part of 2023, continuing to outshine their peers without disabilities, according to the latest National Trends in Disability Employment (nTIDE) semi-monthly update released by Kessler Foundation and the University of New Hampshire’s Institute on Disability (UNH-IOD).
The latest U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Jobs Report, on which the nTIDE update is based, shows that both people with and without disabilities registered gains in employment year-on-year, indicating a sustained economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.
For people with disabilities aged between 16-64, the labor force participation rate grew from 37.8% in March 2022 to 40.2% in March 2023 (an increase of 6.3% or 2.4 percentage points), while for people without disabilities in the same age group, the rate inched up from 77.2% in March 2022 to 77.6% in March 2023 (an increase of 0.5% or 0.4 percentage points).
Labor force participation
The labor force participation rate is a measure of the percentage of people who are part of the labor force, which includes those working, on furlough or temporary layoff, or actively looking for work in the past four weeks, relative to the total population, calculated as the number of people in the labor force divided by the total population multiplied by 100.
“The labor force participation rate was unchanged from last month, 40.2% in February 2023 and March 2023, showing that over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, people with disabilities remained in the labor force, and continue to outperform people without disabilities,” the researchers explain. “Several factors may be driving the increased participation of people with disabilities, including an increase in job opportunities and the pressing need to work as families face inflationary prices.”
The employment outlook for working-age individuals with disabilities has shown promising improvement in the past year, according to recent data. Specifically, the employment-to-population ratio for this group has increased by 7.3% or 2.5 percentage points, rising from 34.1% in March 2022 to 36.6% in March 2023.
Employment-to-population ratio
Meanwhile, their non-disabled counterparts also experienced a slight uptick in their employment-to-population ratio, rising from 74.5% to 74.9% over the same period, an increase of 0.5% or 0.4 percentage points.
The employment-to-population ratio is a crucial metric that reflects the percentage of individuals who are employed in relation to the total population, calculated by dividing the number of employed individuals by the total population and multiplying the result by 100.
“We saw a year-to-year improvement in the employment-to-population ratio for both people with and without disabilities from March 2022 to this year,” the researchers explain. “This probably reflects the emergence of the economy from the COVID-19 pandemic.”
Steady figures
The latest employment figures indicate that the labor force participation rate for working-age individuals with disabilities remained steady at 40.2% in March 2023, the same as the previous month. By contrast, non-disabled individuals saw a slight increase in their labor force participation rate, rising from 77.3% in February 2023 to 77.6% in March 2023, an increase of 0.4% or 0.3 percentage points.
However, the employment-to-population ratio for individuals with disabilities declined marginally from 36.9% in February 2023 to 36.6% in March 2023, a decrease of 0.8% or 0.3 percentage points. Meanwhile, non-disabled individuals experienced a slight uptick in their employment-to-population ratio, rising from 74.4% in February 2023 to 74.9% in March 2023, an increase of 0.7% or 0.5 percentage points.
In March 2023, individuals with disabilities aged 16-64 accounted for 4.0% of the total 149,952,000 workers in the US, representing a workforce of 5,997,000.
