Work Accommodations
| Author | Jeffrey Wilson |
| Pages | 11-14 |
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In the United States, approximately 43 million people have physical or mental disabilities or impairments that substantially limit major life activities. In an effort to avoid discrimination against disabled people in the workplace, Congress enacted in July of 1990 the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). One way that the ADA seeks to improve employment opportunities for disabled people is by requiring employers under certain circumstances to alter the workplace to accommodate disabilities. These alterations are known as workplace accommodations.
Just like individuals of different races, colors, religions, gender, or national origin, individuals with physical or mental disabilities historically have faced discrimination. Disabled people have been excluded from mainstream society, segregated, provided with inferior or unequal services, and denied benefits that non-disabled people enjoy. What is different about the discrimination of disabled people as compared to other types of discrimination is that there is often a rational basis for treating disabled people differently from able-bodied people. Whereas there is usually no rational basis for treating, for example, a woman from South Africa differently from a woman from the United States, there may be a rational basis for treating a woman who is blind differently from a woman with good vision. The visually impaired woman may require the use of Braille, for example.
Another difference in disability discrimination is its intent. Many types of discrimination, such as racial discrimination, are rooted in hostility or hatred toward people who are different. But discrimination against disabled individuals more often is rooted in ignorance or apathy. Some people view disabilities with pity or discomfort, leading to behavior that may patronize people with disabilities. Other people simply fail to consider or understand the needs of disabled people, leading to benign neglect or misguided efforts to assist.
The U.S. Constitution does little to protect those with mental or physical disabilities from discrimination. Courts historically have not applied the Constitution's Equal Protection Clause to discrimination of disabled persons with the same level of scrutiny as discrimination of such protected classes as race, religion, and gender. People with disabilities, therefore, had little or no recourse when their disabilities unfairly prevented them from getting suitable jobs. Only two-thirds of employable disabled persons in the United States were employed in the late 1980s, and many of those employed were not working to their full capacity to earn given their disabilities. By 1990, more than 8 million disabled individuals were
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unemployed and forced to live on welfare and other forms of government assistance. Congress began enacting federal laws in the 1960s designed to protect disabled people, but these laws did not outlaw disability discrimination by employers. Such protections did not enter the workplace until the 1990 passage of the ADA.
The ADA prohibits private and state and local government employers, as well as employment agencies and labor...
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