Weaknesses With the Disability Discrimination Act

The purpose of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is to ensure that disabled people have the same rights as the able-bodied, including rights to such things as employment and access to public facilities. The goal was to promote equal rights for disabled people and to make them viable employees. Unfortunately, the act has what many consider to be weaknesses, and so has been criticized on certain fronts.

• One of the intentions of the law was for it to increase employment among the disabled. Much to the contrary, research has shown that the rate of employment among the disabled under the age of 40 has fallen. Many employers would rather not face the expense of employing a disabled person and so they find ways of avoiding it. Disabled people can be expensive in that a workplace may have to be modified for their benefit. For example, employer may have to install ramps for a wheelchair-bound employee to get into the building.
  
  


• The ADA has not increased the wages of disabled workers. They remain as they were before its passage, at roughly 40 percent of what non-disabled workers are paid. This is a weakness in that one objective of the law was to bring wages of the disabled closer to parity with those of the able-bodied.
  
  


• Lawsuits resulting from the passage of the ADA have also resulted in the necessity of employers going to the expense of paying for insurance. Employment Practices Liability Insurance is purchased by employers to protect them from various types of discrimination suits including those filed by the disabled.
  
  


• In the vast majority of employment discrimination lawsuits (nearly 90 percent) the employer has won. Largely, this is due to the fact that damages are not usually awarded in discrimination cases, therefore they are unattractive to lawyers. The plaintiff may have to represent themselves, which means that they may not have the best counsel.  
  
  


• The major weakness in anti-discrimination law is that it cannot by itself prevent discrimination. Noncompliance with the ADA is still widespread, as it is with civil rights law. Legislation alone is not sufficient to changes the attitudes of society.