Archive:Disability statistics - need for assistance
This article is part of the set of articles on Disability that provides information on the special assistance used or needed by persons having a longstanding health problem or an activity difficulty (LHPAD) for enabling them to work, based on the data reported in the framework of the 2011 ad hoc module of the EU Labour Force Survey (LFS-AHM). The information covers 31 countries (the EU-28 Member States, Turkey, Iceland and Switzerland). The following paragraphs differentiate the assistance needed and the assistance actually used. Whereas the need for assistance refers to persons that are not employed (i.e. unemployed and inactive), the use of assistance refers to employed persons.
"Assistance" encompasses special personal assistance (from family members, relatives, friends, colleagues or other persons), organisational and environmental changes (special equipment/workplace adaptations, and special working arrangement) which help a person carrying out work activities. Such assistance can be regarded as methods to remove barriers to participation in work for disabled persons.
Main statistical findings
About 28% of the not employed persons having a LHPAD would need special assistance
In the EU-28, 27.9% of the persons with LHPAD that are not employed consider that they would need some form of assistance while 8.5% of the employed persons with LHPAD are provided with some assistance to work.
The proportion of the not employed persons with LHPAD that would require assistance fluctuated between 8.1% in France (the only country to record a proportion below 10%) and more than 50% in Iceland, Denmark, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia. For the population with LHPAD but actually employed, the proportions vary far less: from 4.0% in France to a maximum of 33.5% in the Netherlands. Latter country (together with Denmark and Iceland) hence appears to integrate persons with LHPAD particularly well by supplying means of assistance.
Men have a higher need for special assistance at work
In the EU-28, 9.3% of the employed women with LHPAD declared using some form of assistance at work, whereas 7.8% of the employed men with LHPAD used such assistance. The proportion of employed women who used special assistance was higher than the one of employed men for the all the countries, except for Switzerland, Croatia, Greece, Poland and Cyprus. Denmark recorded the highest gap between men and women, with 25.6% of the employed men using special assistance against 33.2% in the employed women group.
Among the not employed population, the percentage of women who would need special assistance at work was smaller than that of men at EU-28 level. Indeed, 29.3% of the not employed population with LHPAD would need special assistance while 26.9% of the women were in this situation. At country level, this tendency was observed for the majority of the countries. The highest differences in the populations were in Cyprus where one men out of two would need special assistance against 37.1% of the not employed women. On the opposite, Iceland recorded a rate of 55.8% for the not employed women, with only 43.3% for the not employed men, who would need special assistance.
'Special working arrangements' is the most indicated form of special assistance
In general at the EU-28 level, and for each type of assistance, the proportion of the employed persons with LHPAD using assistance is lower compared to the percentage of those not employed with LHPAD that would need assistance. For example, 28.1% of the employed that actually use assistance benefited from personal assistance, while 46.6% of the not employed declared needing this type of help. A Special equipment or workplace adaptations concerned 33.5% of the employed and would be needed by 43.9% of the not employed. A special working arrangement concerned 67.8% of the employed and would be needed by 86.8% of the not employed.
At a country level, the large majority of the employed persons with LHPAD actually used special working arrangements and those not employed would need such arrangements. However, some exceptions appeared: in Malta, 67.6% of the not employed would need personal assistance and 63.0% special working arrangements (latter figure uncertain due to small sample size); in Portugal and Romania, most of the employed persons used personal assistance (respectively 61.3% and 65.7%), and less than 50% had special working arrangements); in Turkey, both the employed and not employed used/needed personal assistance (respectively 88.8% and 86.6%); in Sweden, the employed used more special equipment adaptations (62.2%) compared to other types of assistance (4.2% (low reliability) for personal assistance and 56% for special working arrangements).
The not employed men would need more a kind of special assistance than women
At the level of the EU-28, the effect of gender on the different types of special assistance varied depending on the labour status. Indeed, within the not employed persons, the ratio of men who would need special assistance was always higher than the ratio of women. For example, nearly 30% of the non-employed men would need special working arrangement against around 26% for women. In the employed population, the opposite was observed, with a slightly gender gap. For instance, 3.8% of employed women used special equipment or workplace adaptations whereas only 3% of the employed men were in this situation.
Regarding the age distribution, whatever the type of assistance (either needed by the non-employed or actually used by the employed), the ratio of the 45-64 years age group was higher comparing to the other age groups. For instance, within the not employed with LHPAD, 34.3% of the 45-54 years olds would need a special working arrangement. More noteworthy is that, when comparing the types of assistance, an over representation of persons aged 15-24 (whatever their labour status) was registered for the use of personal assistance (2.5% for the employed population, 8.7% for the non-employed population).
Data sources and availability
All statistics presented in this article are derived from the European Union Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS). This is a quarterly, large sample survey providing results for the population living in private households in the EU, EFTA and the candidate countries.
The EU-LFS included an ad-hoc module on employment of disabled people in 2002 and 2011. The aim of this module was to provide information on the situation of disabled people on the labour market as compared to those without disabilities. The target population of this module is the working age population (i.e. population aged 15-64).
Concepts and definitions
- Longstanding means that the health problem has lasted or is likely to last for at least 6 months. The main characteristic of a longstanding problem is that it is permanent and may be expected to require a long period of supervision, observation or care.
- An activity is defined as: ‘the performance of a task or action by an individual’ and thus activity difficulty is defined as ‘the difficulty the individual experience in performing a basic activity (seeing, hearing, lifting, bending, etc). The length of difficulty must have lasted or be expected to last for six months or more.
Context
The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities recognizes in Article 27 “the right of persons with disabilities to work, on an equal basis with others; this includes the right to the opportunity to gain a living by work freely chosen or accepted in a labour market and work environment that is open, inclusive and accessible to persons with disabilities”. This includes prohibition of discrimination, protection of rights, access to education, employment in the public and private sector, possibilities for self-employment and support in order to maintain employment on equal terms with others. The OECD acknowledged as far back as 1992 that: “A need for more co-ordination of all policies which affect the labour market participation of people with disabilities is an overriding concern”. The national reports on the employment of disabled people in European countries provide evidence of widespread initiatives in policy and legislation in recent years. These include, for example, the right to an interview (e.g. in Poland and Denmark), assistance in adaptation of the workplace, employer incentives/subsidies, rights to flexible working, job matching, personal assistance at work, support for self-employment, etc. Although many initiatives have been taken, and more focus has been given to the integration of disabled people, more can be done. There is thus still a need for more knowledge, and more co-ordination in the area. Indeed, there is a relative lack of information about the types of jobs and sectors that disabled people are employed in, not least because many disabled people employed in the ordinary labour market are not recognised or measured in reported figures, e.g. because they are not recorded as having work limitations or receiving specific support services.
See also
Further Eurostat information
Publications
- Statistical analysis and publication of the results of the 2011 Labour Force Survey ad hoc module on employment of disabled people
Database
- Disability, see:
- Access to labour market for disabled people (Source LFS)(hlth_dsb_lm)
Dedicated section
- Health, see
- Disability
Methodology / Metadata
- Prevalence of disability (source LFS) (hlth_dsb_prv)
- Background articles in Statistics Explained
Other information
- Commission Regulation (EU) No 317/2010 of 16 April 2010 adopting the specifications of the 2011 ad hoc module on employment of disabled people for the labour force sample survey provided for by Council Regulation (EC) No 577/98
External links
- European Disability Strategy 2010-2020
- The International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF)
- United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD)
[[Category:<Health>|Disability statistics - need for assistance or support and offer]] [[Category:<Population>|Disability statistics - need for assistance or support and offer]] [[Category:<Statistical article>|Disability statistics - need for assistance or support and offer]]