I receive disability benefits from Supplemental Security Income (SSI ) and Social Security, and must undergo a periodic review at the Social Security Office. At one of these meeting my caseworker told me that since the balance on my bank statement exceeded a certain amount (I believe the amount was $1,400), I had to provide copies of my bank statements going back several months to prove that my bank balance and hence my cash assets did not exceed $2,000. I receive these “benefits” from the government because I am “disabled” and unemployed. My current income of about $700 per month (SSI, Social Security, and food stamps) places me below the federal poverty level for a one-person household (the level for such a household is $8,980 in annual income). My joblessness is largely a result of the government’s refusal to enforce the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which was supposed to prohibit discrimination against disabled people in employment. The government enforces the draconian law that mandates taking money away from a beneficiary if he or she manages to save more than $2,000, yet the ADA, which was passed to help remedy the joblessness and resultant poverty that a mislabeled person must endure, is not enforced!

I describe myself as “mislabeled” because I believe that the labels that society gives us, “handicapped” or “disabled,” are not meaningful and carry many negative, unfair connotations and are inaccurate and harmful. I think many of us shoot ourselves in the foot when we use these labels. I want to be known as abled, not disabled. I prefer to be seen as a person with ability rather than disability. Sure, I must use a wheelchair, but does that make me unable to do what I need to succeed? I don’t believe so. Why should I play society’s game of categorizing people, including myself, as inherently defective? If I go that route, then I cripple myself and others.

There are many ways people may rationalize denying jobs to mislabeled people. Perhaps the most common reason given is that a mislabeled person “can’t work.” Obviously, one may ask, “Can’t work at what?” A good case can be made that many people can’t work at jobs for which they are not qualified. Needless to say, some jobs may be simply out of reach for some individuals. A blind person, for example, could not sensibly take a job as a bus driver. A person who uses a wheelchair would not be qualified to work as a longshoreman. Nevertheless, with “reasonable accommodations” they may very well be able to work in some occupations in which being blind or using a wheelchair does not present an insurmountable physical barrier. A person’s ability to work at a particular job should be made by assessing his or her abilities and qualifications rather than merely assuming the person cannot work.

Another common reason to deny employment to a mislabeled person is to deny the denial–that is, insist that jobs are in fact readily available to that person. Rather than admit that hiring practices very much exclude mislabeled people, blame the unemployed person for his or her joblessness. Mislabeled people can always be characterized as “lazy” or “lacking ambition” to shift blame from employers to the unemployed. A few years ago I had a homemaker who often criticized me for being jobless. She even went so far as to tell me that I was “lazy.” She said “You won’t help these places pay for the things you want, you won’t work to pay back your college degree or to help pay taxes. I realize you have some physical issues; however, so did people who died in the Twin Towers. I have a great deal of trouble finding sympathy for someone who just takes and expects everyone, even people who are trying to make a private business work, to pay high taxes so more people can make demands on their money and get something for nothing and not have to be inconvenienced by working.” “These places” she refers to are the local establishments I exposed as violating Title III of the ADA, which prohibits discrimination in public places. She seems to believe that I somehow ripped off the government by getting a college education, only to avoid what she calls the “inconvenience of working.”

It is very ironic to me that my attempt to get public buildings made accessible to mislabeled people has resulted in such a reaction. How am I supposed to find work if I cannot enter the building? The accusation that I don’t pay taxes is simply not true. I pay both school and sales taxes. Considering that I and the hundreds of other mislabeled people here in Williamsport pay taxes, should we not get our money’s worth by having the ADA enforced to protect our rights? Finally, my “laziness” is amazing for a man who worked very hard to get a college education, only to have his chances of finding gainful employment thwarted by being excluded by those poor business owners who don’t wish to incur the expense of making their hiring practices open to mislabeled people. In spite of the apparently insurmountable social and physical barriers to employment I believe there is hope for mislabeled people who wish to work at a good job. One option is self-employment. Working for yourself at home, you need not go through the meat grinder that is the job search. You can make sure your work space is not encumbered with barriers. And, maybe the best part of all, you need not put up with cruel and stupid people who believe that working with a person they mislabel is beneath them. If you succeed, you’ll finally get out of poverty and won’t need to endure the indignation that I dealt with at the SSA office in Williamsport. I’m currently studying graphic design, and I hope to start my own business someday. It’s my way of escaping joblessness, poverty, and government “benefits.”