Personality and Disability Employment Gap in the United States: Evidence from the Disability and Use of Time Supplement

Understanding the factors contributing to the disability employment gap is critical for improving the employment opportunities for people with disabilities. Personal characteristics like age and gender have been studied but little is known about the role of personality and employment for those with and without disabilities. Differences in these factors are also expected for individuals who identify as work-limited disabled. This paper examines the role of personality traits in explaining the disability employment gap in the United States by applying a structural equation model followed by a tailored decomposition technique and taking advantage of uniquely rich data from the Disability and Use of Time Supplement in 2013. Age and female were significant predictors of employment only for those without disabilities. Personality predicted employment for those without disabilities and non-worklimited disabled, but not for the work-limited disabled. The employment gap between those without disabilities and work-limited disabled was significant but not in comparison to those individuals who consider themselves non-work-limited disabled. The findings highlight the importance of controlling for personality traits when estimating the employment gap between those with and without disabilities and understanding its determinants.