Supported Employment & Community Inclusion

Employment services help clients with Intellectual/Developmental Disabilities (I/DD) find and maintain jobs that match their goals and skills. Community inclusion helps clients develop skills, foster independence, and form relationships with non-disabled community members.

Reimbursement rate caps are structured in a way to incentivize individual employment over community inclusion:
Individual employment= $75/hour
Community inclusion = $35/hour 

Additional funding and support services are available ONLY to clients enrolled in individual employment, but not Community Inclusion. 

The Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee (JLARC) staff analyzed client data and found that Individual Supported Employment accounted for:

• 82% of total service expenditures ($54.7m) on Developmental Disabilities
• 88% of working age adults with developmental disabilities are not employed (only 6885 individuals with developmental disabilities are employed statewide)
• They worked an average of 46 hours per month and earned an average wage of $583. 
• Only 672 people statewide earned a living wage (i.e., more than the federal poverty level). Those with high support needs worked an average of 13 hours per month or less. 
• AND the supported employment agencies are earning an average of $950 per year per person more than the person with the disability. That adds up to over 6.53 million dollars more in earnings for the agencies than the persons with disabilities. 

The Legislative Auditor makes three recommendations. DDA should:
Develop a system to measure the quality of life outcomes for its clients.
Ensure that eligible clients are offered the choice of community inclusion. Report to the Legislature on its efforts to strengthen and expand the community inclusion program.

We believe people with ASD/DD offer untapped potential to employers, they are loyal and hard working. They have lower absenteeism in comparison with their neurotypical peers. An example of evidence-based vocational training program for young adults with ASD is Deployed 2 Work, a federally funded, randomized study for military-connected or military dependent youth with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). We hope Washington State continues to improve on the current 12% total employment rate and 10% of this small subset earning over federal poverty limits. 

***Washington State doesn’t recognize level 1 autism as a developmental disability, Anecdotally, based on calls we get from adults on the spectrum, we can say there’s a high rate of unemployment in level 1 ASD as well.

Economic vitality is crucial to the quality of life for autistic adults. Learn more about ways you can get involved.