Disability news and resources in North America

Disability news and resources

This page lists the countries in North America with resources and recent highlights.

Countries

Recent Highlights

What is the pay gap between persons with and without disabilities?

“The 2019 CIS revealed that persons with disabilities aged 16 years and older had an average annual income of about $11,500 less than persons without disabilities ($43,400 and $55,200, respectively). This results in a 21.4% pay gap between persons with and without disabilities, or persons with disabilities earned 79 cents to every dollar earned by persons without disabilities.” (2023, Statistics Canada)

Ministers take steps towards ensuring disability-inclusive air travel. (2023, Disability Insider)

In Guatemala:

How do people with disabilities make healthcare decisions? A qualitative study focusing on use of primary healthcare services in three regions. (2023)

In Mexico:

Women with disabilities: the other face of migration. (2023, Yo También)

In the United States:

Assume that I can brilliant, bold video rejecting the self-fulfilling prophecy of negative assumptions about people with Down Syndrome. (Mar, CoorDown)

America Promises Equality for Disabled Students. It’s Failing. A project exploring “how our country’s education system underserves them—and the fight to change that.”:

‘It has been nearly 50 years since the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) passed, guaranteeing a “free appropriate public education” to disabled students. But our system is not living up to this promise. More than one-third of these students don’t graduate high school. The Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights has more than 2,500 open investigations into complaints from parents of children with disabilities; some have been unresolved for over a decade.’ (2023, Mother Jones)

Disability Inclusion Imperative a report showing how:

“the business case for hiring persons with disabilities has become even stronger. Specifically, companies that have led on key disability inclusion criteria over that time saw 1.6 times more revenue, 2.6 times more net income and 2 times more economic profit than other companies in the Disability Equality Index.” (2023, Accenture and Disability:IN)

Taking on the Unfriendly Skies: Are Airlines Hearing Wheelchair Users’ Protests?

“As a high-level quad who flies on a regular basis, it’s disheartening to be asked for more patience when our rights continue to be violated and our lives are at stake. And though little seems to have changed for current flyers, what has changed is the groundswell of voices pushing to bring down one of the last major walls of exclusion from equal access to modern mass transportation since the ADA was passed 33 years ago.” (2023, New Mobility)

Amazon Got a Perfect Score on Disability Inclusion—From a Group It Helps Fund – Mother Jones —From a Group It Helps Fund:

“Disability:IN released its annual “Best Places to Work” Disability Equality Index, which grades how well companies prioritize and accommodate disabled employees. One company that earned a perfect score: Amazon, which has been accused of disability discrimination by state agencies and current and former staff.” (2023, Mother Jones)

Jordyn Zimmerman is redefining communication as a nonspeaking advocate for disability rights, describing “augmentative and alternative communication”:

‘It’s essentially all the ways someone may communicate besides speaking. It refers to any tool or method or support to help someone be heard or understood. The “augmentative” is usually meant to add to someone’s speech, and the “alternative” is usually meant to be instead of someone’s speech. For me, iPad paired with a text-based application serves as the tool that allows me to reliably and effectively be heard and understood.’ (2023, the 19th)

Long COVID Is Being Erased—Again What was once outright denial has morphed into a subtler dismissal. (2023, The Atlantic)

What Are the Top Barriers to Digital Inclusion in 2023? “79% of website users and 78% of app users said they feel frustrated because they don’t have as much independence as a sighted person when completing digital tasks.” (2023, American Foundation for the Blind)

Guide to Investigating Disability Issues (2023, Global Investigative Journalism Network)

Profound discussion of how ableism enables all forms of inequity. “Ableism plays a leading role in how we frame, understand, construct and respond to race, class, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, nationality, criminal status, disability, and countless other identities.” (2023, Truthout)

Ageist? Ableist? Who, Me? “Think what older people could learn from them about asking for help, adapting to impairment, and age pride! Think what younger people with disabilities could learn from olders about moving through life. Think how we’d all benefit if hearing and mobility aids were stripped of stigma. Let’s get interdependent!” (2023, Generations)

Countries

Recent Highlights

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