How many in the U.S. are disabled? Proposed census changes would greatly decrease count

The U.S. Census Bureau may soon change the way one of its nationwide surveys asks about disability. But alarm bells are ringing for many researchers and activists, because the proposed change would dramatically decrease the official number of people in the United States who are considered disabled. “Disabled people are already underserved,” says Scott Landes, a sociologist at Syracuse University who studies disability. Altering the way the Census Bureau gathers disability statistics, he argues, will generate “inaccurate information.” In an 18 October letter , he and other disability researchers and advocates called for the Census Bureau to reconsider. The change concerns a section of the bureau’s annual American Community Survey (ACS), which serves as an important source of demographic, social, and economic data. The ACS uses a set of six yes-or-no questions—related to difficulty with hearing, vision, and other functions—to determine disability status. A respondent who answers “yes” to any of those questions is counted as disabled. Many state and federal programs rely on ACS data when allocating funding, and the data are used to evaluate whether disabled people are being given equal opportunities when it comes to things like housing, education, and health care. But the ACS is also a vital resource for researchers. “It certainly has the ability to drown out a lot of better designed sources of disability data,” says Jaime Seltzer, a d...
Source: Science of Aging Knowledge Environment - Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research