The coronavirus is showing many employers that they can operate remotely -- but people with disabilities have been rebuffed when asking about this accommodation for years.
Robert Kingett, a 30-year-old freelance writer, author and accessibility consultant in Chicago, Ill., is blind. He also has cerebral palsy, which makes standing for long periods of time difficult. But Kingett has had trouble finding jobs where he can work remotely, he said, because positions like editor gigs or internships would be only partially remote — for example, still requiring applicants to attend on-site meetings.
“Working from home is the best thing that has ever happened to me,” Matos, 30, told MarketWatch. “I have been trying for years in tech to get to a place where I could permanently work from home.” He added, “I have had the most uphill battle just to get to this place.” “ ‘This recent shift, especially in the publishing industry, proves that they can actually do most work-from-home, given no other option.’ ”
“I think this is a great middle finger to the excuse of, ‘We just don’t have the technology to do remote work,’” he said. “This recent shift, especially in the publishing industry, proves that they can actually do most work-from-home, given no other option.” “I was very perplexed,” said Tina, who asked that her last name not be published. “I didn’t know why they were fighting me so hard on it.”
— Vilissa Thompson, a disability-rights advocate and social worker Employment attorney Paula Brantner, the president and principal of the firm PB Work Solutions, said that the difficulty in some circumstances “lies with the manager’s discomfort in managing in a situation where they can’t physically look over someone’s shoulder” or “constantly check in with them, interrupt them, go to their desk, bring them into face-to-face meetings.
Not everyone is convinced that America’s current acceptance of remote work will translate to long-term change after the pandemic is over. Vilissa Thompson, a disability-rights advocate and social worker in Winnsboro, S.C., who has osteogenesis imperfecta , said she had turned down a position last month because the employer — a disability-centered organization, no less — had unrealistic expectations of how long remote work due to the pandemic might be necessary.
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