The labour market situation for people with disability 2022
Every third person with disability has faced discrimination at work
Statistical news from Statistics Sweden 2023-04-28 8.00
One in three people with disability have felt discriminated against in their working life related to their disability. The most common type of discrimination is not getting a job one was adequately qualified for.
On behalf of the Government, Statistics Sweden has carried out a survey on the labour market situation for people with disability. The questions were asked directly after the Labour Force Survey (LFS).
In the survey, 10 percent of the population aged 16–64 years state to have a disability. Among those, 71 percent consider that their disability partly or fully reduces their ability to work.
The employment rate of people with disability is 52 percent, which is lower than the employment rate of 81 percent for the rest of the population.
– People with disability have a lower employment rate than the rest of the population. This is particularly true for people with disability with a reduced ability to work. Their employment rate is 44 percent, says Marc Doppelbauer, Analyst at Statistics Sweden.
There is no significant difference in employment rate between women and men with disability, regardless of whether their ability to work is reduced or not.
One in three have experienced discrimination in their working life
Around 32 percent of people with disability have experienced some form of discrimination in their working life related to their disability. Among people with reduced ability to work, 37 percent have experienced some form of discrimination.
– Of the disability-related types of discrimination examined, the most common is not getting a job one applied to and was adequately qualified for, says Marc Doppelbauer.
Low employment rate among those residing in housing with special services
This year, for the first time, Statistics Sweden has also examined employment and income in the group of people with disability who reside in housing with special services under the Act concerning Support and Service for Persons with Certain Functional Impairments (“LSS”). The reporting is done separately, because people living in group homes are no longer included in the LFS since 2021.
The results are presented in a separate report and show that in 2021 there were 25,600 people aged 16-64 who resided in housing with special services. This was 0.3 percent of women and 0.5 percent of men.
According to SCB's register of the population's labour market status (BAS), the employment rate of people residing in housing with special services was 3 percent for women and 4 percent for men in November 2021. 93 percent of women and 90 percent of men had the labour market status “sick”.
People residing in housing with special services had a lower median income than the population at large in 2021, at SEK 148,000 for women and SEK 147,000 for men. Income disparity in the group was small, because sickness and activity allowances make up a large part of the income for most of those in housing with special services.
Definitions and explanations
The labour market situation for people with disability 2022
The survey includes people aged 16–64 years who are in Sweden’s population register. The sample is selected by means of a question concerning disability that is asked directly after the Labour Force Survey (LFS). People who indicate that they have a disability are asked whether their disability reduces their ability to work. They are also asked four questions about discrimination in their working life.
Due to revisions carried out in the 2022 survey, the results in this report are not comparable with those of previous years. The main change was a shift to a new question to define the group of people with disability, which has had an impact on the size and composition of the group. The purpose of the revisions is to make the definition of disability comparable with other statistics in the field such as the Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (SILC).
People with disability include those who answered “Yes” to the following question: “Do you have any physical, mental or intellectual disability?”
The results for employment and unemployment in the total population presented in this report differ from the official LFS statistics since the sample for this survey is limited to the age group 16-64 and the estimation procedure is different from the LFS.
Disabled persons residing in housing with special services – labour market status and income
The statistics cover the 25,600 people aged 16-64 resided in housing with special services under the Act concerning Support and Service for Persons with Certain Functional Impairments (“LSS”) in 2021 and who were registered in Sweden on December 31, 2021. The population has been taken from the National Board of Health and Welfare's register of interventions under LSS.
The statistics refer to 2021, which is the most recent data available. Data on employment refer to November 2021. Data on daily activities and income refer to the full year 2021.
The labour market status of the population is a monthly statistic that combines data on different activities. It is hierarchical, meaning that each person is classified in stages. First, it is examined whether the person can be classified as employed, then unemployed, student, retired and finally whether the person is classified as sick.
A person who is classified as sick has during the month received compensation from the Swedish Social Insurance Agency such as sickness benefit, activity compensation (except for extended schooling), sick pay, rehabilitation allowance, occupational injury allowance, disease carrier allowance or risk group allowance. In addition, the labour market status “sick” is only obtained if the person is not classified as employed, unemployed, student or retired.
The income level refers to net income, also known as disposable income. Net income is the sum of all a person's taxable and non-taxable income minus taxes and other negative transfers (e.g., student loan repayments).
Publication
The labour market situation for people with disability 2022
Disabled persons residing in housing with special services – labour market status and income
Feel free to use the facts from this statistical news but remember to state Source: Statistics Sweden.