Posts In: Employment

With the unemployment rate for the blind hovering around 70 percent, the National Federation of the Blind Employment Committee is dedicated to providing resources and information to help the blind become gainfully employed.

Since its inception in 1936, the federal Randolph-Sheppard program has become the most effective government employment program for the blind. Today some one thousand blind entrepreneurs operate businesses on federal property throughout the United States, ranging from full-service restaurants and cafeterias to vending machine stocking and maintenance operations.

This paper sets forth the position of the National Federation of the Blind (NFB) with respect to the proposed addition to Title V of the Rehabilitation Act, known hereinafter as Section 511, contained in the draft reauthorization of the Workforce Investment Act recently reported favorably by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.

Yesterday was the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), which is a monumental piece of legislation for most American workers.  The FLSA provides for the payment of a federal minimum wage, which is now $7.25 per hour, to every American citizen.

Section 14(c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act exempts over three thousand employers from paying their workers with disabilities the federal minimum wage, allowing them to pay workers subminimum wages as low as three cents per hour.  The Fair Wages for Workers with Disabilities Act of 2013 will repeal this unfair, discriminatory, and immoral provision.

Under Section 14(c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act, a flawed formula has been used for years to calculate the commensurate “piece rate” wage for workers with disabilities.  This formula, based on average wages and survey data, works mathematically, but fails the common sense test.

Last night during his State of the Union address, President Obama described the need for better education and training in order to build a more qualified workforce.  He went further to describe how the current minimum wage leaves many hourly workers, particularly those with families, earning wages below the poverty line.