Addressing Visual Impairment and Unemployment

In 2022, the Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) – in collaboration with the University of Birmingham – published research that revealed only one in four visually impaired people were currently in paid employment. The results were effectively unchanged from the RNIB’s findings in 2014. These rather bleak figures indicate that something substantial needs to be done to improve employment opportunities for this minority group.

More recently, a US study sought to further investigate how visual impairment (VI) affects an individual’s employment status. The researchers took data from the 2022 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), developing a multivariable logistic regression model to evaluate the odds of unemployment, while factoring in a number of independent variables, such as race, level of education, and self-reported visual disability. Any individuals from the survey who were retired, still in education, aged over 65, self-employed, or either seasonal or contract workers were excluded from the study.

The researchers – based at the Morsani College of Medicine in Florida and the Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago – found that, “consistent with historical studies,” the degree of visual impairment experienced by individuals directly affected how likely they were to be gainfully employed. The US study authors suggest that their findings could be just as easily translated to the UK: “Education among those with impaired vision is an important and modifiable variable that can positively influence the chances of employment.”

Martin O’Kane, the Strategic Lead for Employment and Technology at RNIB, explains further: “As young people with sight loss make the transition to life beyond compulsory education, they need more informed advice on all of their options to continue education, move into training, or sample work. There is a need for greater partnership between schools, career advisors, and VI Education Specialists to make this happen, so that young people with sight loss are not restricted in their pathways into employment.”