Sen. Elizabeth Warren released an exciting, thorough plan this past Thursday that promises to support, protect, and uplift people with disabilities. The deep-dive proposal titled “Protecting the Rights and Equality of People with Disabilities” isn’t the Massachusetts Democrat’s first attempt at connecting with voters with disabilities; some of the plans she’s already released, such as her education plan and plan for affordable housing and renters’ rights, have discussed people with disabilities specifically. Her new plan, however, is a major effort that’s solely about the disabled community, and it covers a lot of important ground.
What other major 2020 hopefuls have released proposals on disability rights? Mayor Pete Buttigieg has a proposal for people with disabilities. Other Democrats with disability-focused plans who are now out of the race include Sen. Kamala Harris and former HUD Julián Castro. Of all their plans, Warren’s rings closest to Castro’s, but is still a fresh spin.
Perhaps the biggest picture change Warren’s proposal brings is her promise to end the program which allows employers to legally pay some people with disabilities less money. If that sounds like discrimination to you, you’re not alone. In fact, Warren describes it as “government-sanctioned pay discrimination” in her proposal.
Right now, the program allows employers to pay people with disabilities less than the federal minimum wage (which is still a shameful $7.25 an hour). How much less? A lot less. Some reports found that people with disabilities were being paid less than one dollar per hour. That’s obscene. In line with Warren’s fight for a $15 minimum wage, workers with disabilities would finally earn (at least) that amount of money too. She also wants to pass laws that help workers with disabilities actually transition to jobs that pay more.
As well as being obscene, the sub-minimum wage issue is also part of the conversation people need to have about living in poverty and living with disabilities. Of course, not all people who live with disabilities are low-income. But, for people who receive certain assistance from the government, it can quickly become a tricky—if not perilous—situation to safely navigate and transition out of.
Warren’s proposal addresses this exact issue. For example, Warren wants to end the “benefits cliff” that currently keeps many people with disabilities trapped between a rock and a hard place. People who receive Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) are essentially punished if they go back to work and make even just a dollar more than a low threshold. Her proposal says the current eligibility and income caps “trap beneficiaries in poverty," and that just about sums it up. Today, there is a five-month waiting period for SSDI benefits after your disability determination. Warren wants to end that, too.
Relatedly, though separately, Warren wants to end asset limits. Asset limits make it so that people who receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI), can’t have more than a certain amount of income or assets. General financial (and life) advice encourages people to develop assets and build savings—it’s long past time that people with disabilities who receive assistance should be able to do the same and build their own economic independence.
Warren wants to update the rules surrounding SSI in terms of marriage, as well. Right now, some people with disabilities hold back on marriage because they fear the legal union will cost them a chunk of their benefits. While marriage equality in terms of same-sex marriage is inarguably a major win, it’s actually not the end of the line for marriage rights—at least until people can get married without losing their benefits.
Given that Warren often references her background as a public school teacher, it’s no shock that her plan circles back to education. Her proposal seeks to completely fund the federal government’s part of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) Act. She also wants to work to correct the instances of students with disabilities being unfairly punished or even suspended.
Unsurprisingly, much of Warren’s plan connects with health care. One important component in terms of Medicare for All is coverage for people to receive direct home care. Looking at Medicaid coverage, Warren wants to help people with disabilities (as well as the elderly) get the support they need so they can live in their own spaces and communities, rather than the “bias,” as she puts it, toward institutional care.
Warren’s proposal also stresses the necessity of making assistive technologies actually affordable. In line with some of the proposals she’s already released, Warren’s new plan stresses the importance of affordable and accessible housing, better access to care for people with disabilities who are incarcerated, voting booth access, and accessible public transportation.
Warren’s plan weighs in at a whopping 16 pages. Warren credits and thanks the disability advocates and educators who she says helped her shape the plan, which is fantastic. People with disabilities are chronically left out of politics, even when it comes to their own rights. In fact, people with disabilities are all too often left out of decisions when it comes to even their own care; as she writes in her plan’s introduction, people with disabilities are systemically “excluded, exploited, and institutionalized.”
It’s long past time for that to change, and candidates taking time to build proposals around the needs of the community, rather than what they think a community needs, is a big step in the right direction.