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Today, he's the executive director of the President's Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities (PCEPD). And he has a new message: Access to the World Wide Web will give the disabled more power to buy goods and services, and help business tap a new job pool. Chatting recently in his wheelchair, he lists reasons why disabled people must participate in the Information Age revolution by having access to the Web. "First, the country must recognize that businesses are becoming more electronic, and as a result electronic commerce is spiraling. Second, the economy is changing to an information technology base thus creating a shortage of workers -- and opportunities for disabled people. Third, people with disabilities are among the largest unemployed populations in the country. Lastly, disabled people are consumers." IMPRESSIVE STATS. As businesses build Web sites to sell their goods and services to consumers, they are making it easier to transact business with their suppliers and distributors. Some industry estimates show E-commerce spending set to quadruple from about $12 billion in 1998 to $44 billion worldwide by 2002. And E-commerce gives consumers the convenience of shopping 24 hours daily. Lancaster has dozens of statistics like that right at his fingertips: "50% of the households in the country that have Internet access will make purchases online by the end of this year," is another he throws out. He cites a report released last year by the U.S. Commerce Dept. titled The Emerging Digital Economy. It concludes that information technology (IT) industries are growing at more than double the rate of the overall economy. Already, IT represents 8.2% of U.S. gross domestic product and has driven on average 25% of real economic growth over each of the last five years, according to the Commerce report. Traffic on the Internet doubles every 100 days -- and the overwhelming bulk of it is business-related. Of profound importance to the national economic health is the shortage of workers in the IT sector and in digital technologies. "Business leaders are running out of qualified people, particularly in the high-tech industries, with the labor shortage likely to become tighter in the next 15 years. And computer-related jobs are among the fastest growing job occupations in the world," Lancaster says. More than 345,000 computer programmer and systems analyst jobs are vacant in U.S. companies with more than 100 employees, according to the Information Technology Association of America. FALLING BARRIERS. IT-related jobs pay very well, too. These workers on average earn almost $46,000 per year compared to an average of $28,000 for the private sector as a whole. And the ITA estimates that demand is expected to grow from 874,00 jobs in 1996 to 1.8 million by 2006. "A positive result from this labor shortage is barriers of discrimination are beginning to fall, and businesses are hiring disabled people," Lancaster says. U.S. Census Bureau data released in 1996 shows there were 29.4 million working-age Americans with disabilities in the 21- to 64-year-old age group. Of this number, 15.4 million were employed (52%), and more than 14 million (48%) were unemployed. About 79% of the 14.2 million people with severe disabilities are jobless, Census says. Unemployment is highest among African Americans and Hispanics with disabilities. Census says 72.2% of African Americans with disabilities and nearly 52% of Hispanics with disabilities aren't working. "These figures are abominable," says Lancaster. The disabled offer more than just an underused job pool in cyberspace. Lancaster encourages businesses to also look at the large untapped customer base in the disability market. "At 20% of the population, people with disabilities comprise the nation's largest minority group," says Lancaster. There are significant opportunities to the business community here in strategic marketing. FLASHY, BUT USELESS. Statistics gathered by the PCEPD show that disabled people have $175 billion in discretionary income, and more than 20.3 million people in the country have at least one family member with a disability. Access to the Internet presents significant opportunities to people with disabilities (see Assistive Technology, 4/21/99, "Online School: A Boon for Disabled Students -- and Teachers"). Unfortunately, Web developers often focus on creating flashy, eye-catching graphics that are inaccessible or hard to use by Web users with disabilities, particularly people with eye strain, blindness, low vision, or color blindness. With more people using the Web at home, and with the numbers of disabled people rising as the population ages, it makes good business sense for companies to address Web accessibility issues so that disabled people have an avenue to online products and services. Otherwise, companies "will lose these customers," Lancaster argues. "Employers can lead and ensure that any Web sites they develop are accessible to disabled people." Share your opinion of Bowe's new book on BW Online's Assistive Tech Forum. Or, if you have a question about assistive technology, write to John at JMMAW@aol.com EDITED BY DOUGLAS HARBRECHT |
