Chicago Tribune business columnist David Greising makes some excellent
points about the state of business today and people with disabilities in
light of the recent supreme court ruling.  Rather than accommodate,
business either ignores the law or fights people with disabilities.  As
he points out, imagine what the world would be like today if businesses
in the 1960s fought race discrimination concerns by challenging the whole
notion of race and questioned aggressively how dark someone's skin had to
be in order to be protected under the law.  Of course there was a huge
mass movement then that would not tolerate such corporate posturing.
today, disability leaders blame the Supreme Court rather than Toyota who
intentionally added duties and responsibilities to the job of the woman
who brought the lawsuit. Duties which managers knew she could not do in
hopes of her being fired or quitting.  I have heard of no one saying they
or their family was not going to buy Toyota cars.

Kelly

Chicago Tribune

Accommodate ADA and get on with business
David Greising
Published January 9, 2002

The wailing was intense when the Americans with Disabilities Act was
passed
more than a decade ago. Business leaders feared the law would be
arbitrary,
expensive and intrusive.

A different kind of screaming came forth Tuesday: war whoops from some
corner offices when the U.S. Supreme Court issued another ruling that
narrows the ADA.

Both cries were misplaced overreactions.

The ADA has not been as costly and capricious as business first feared.
Nor
does Tuesday's court ruling wipe out much of the law's impact, either.

That's a lot of screaming and whooping and worrying and suing, yet we
still
haven't gotten to the meat of the issue: the rights of disabled people to
"reasonable accommodation" in the workplace without visiting "undue
hardship" on employers.

Instead, employers and workers still are arguing over what qualifies as a
disability.

Only one certainty emerges from Tuesday's ruling: The courts have wasted
a
decade just getting started on the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Lawyers have driven the ADA into an unproductive cul de sac. They have
talked circles around questions about nearsightedness, AIDS, breast
cancer,
bad backs, and now, sore arms.

On Tuesday, the Supremes ruled former Toyota engine assembler Ella
Williams'
carpal tunnel syndrome did not qualify for ADA protection. It was not
permanent and long-lasting, and she can still perform the typical tasks
of
everyday life--including jobs different from the repeated car-polishing
that
aggravated her sore arms.

Corporate defense lawyers like to call these "threshold issues." By this,
they mean you can't get to the real question until you've passed this
test.

The lawyers ought to call them "tollbooth issues." That's because society
has to pay millions in legal fees and an untold cost in delayed justice
before we get to the core controversies.

Imagine if the same thing had happened after the Civil Rights Act was
passed
in 1964. A decade later, the courts wouldn't have decided what skin tone
made a person "black enough" to be considered African-American. Or
whether a
Muslim was "devout enough" to merit protection from religious
discrimination.

Fortunately for all of us, the world is not run by lawyers. The smart
people
in business have moved ahead, accepted the spirit of the ADA, and happily
discovered how wrong their lobbying groups were about the untold costs of
the law. Turns out it is 40 times less expensive to make "reasonable
accommodations" than to shoulder the cost of terminating an employee,
according to a University of Iowa study.

Turns out companies as varied as Sears, Hughes Electronics, Manpower,
Coors
and Owens Corning cut worker's comp costs, improved employee morale,
reduced
turnover or saved on retraining costs by implementing progressive ADA
programs.

A Harris Poll of 400 major companies in 1995 found the typical firm spent
only $233 on each ADA-related accommodation. Research from the Job
Accommodation Network found companies get a $50 return in productivity
and
saved costs from every $1 spent on ADA-related accommodations.

There is research arguing the ADA actually has hurt disabled people.
Studies
from the University of Chicago argue employment and compensation levels
have
fallen among disabled people, in part because companies steer clear of
them
for fear of ADA-related litigation.

Peter Blanck, an Iowa law professor who has done workplace studies on
ADA's
impact, says some businesses can't resist holding out against the law.

"It's a general maxim that the federal government is seen as intrusive
and
disruptive to an employer's judgment," he says. "Some resist [embracing
the
ADA] even if it doesn't make a bit of difference to their cost."

The vast majority of companies have accepted the ADA and reasonably
accommodate job applicants, employees and customers with special needs.

Those who haven't will continue paying tolls on the legal cul de sac, and
get nowhere.

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