Income Security Policy Paper No. 4
How People with
Disabilities Fare
When Public Policies Change-Past Present, and
Future
Richard V. Burkhauser, Robert H. Haveman, and Barbara L. Wolfe
March 1992
Abstract: This paper analyzes the effects of two decades
of federal disability policy and macroeconomic
fluctuation on the well-being of men with
disabilities. It finds that both have
dramatically affected the economic well-being
of people with disabilities both absolutely
and relative to people without disabilities.
Using data from the Current Population Survey
(1968-1988) it finds that by 1987 the
households of white or well-educated male
heads with disabilities had fully recovered
from the program cuts and recession of the
early 1980s. However, to a large extent this
recovery was due to additional earnings by
spouses.
Alternatively, the households of the doubly disadvantaged-nonwhite or poorly educated males with disabilities-did not recover from their recession depths. It concludes that the new mandates on business aimed at integrating people with disabilities into society are not likely to help the doubly handicapped and that improvements in their well-being will likely depend on more generous income transfers or increased earning of those with whom they live.
A revised version of this paper
appears as "How People with Disabilities
Fare When Public Policies Change," Journal
of Policy Analysis and Management,
12(2)(Spring 1993): 429-433. Those interested
in this work should see that journal.
Income
Security Policy Paper Series
Aging
Studies Program Page
Free CPR Publications Subscription
