Determinants of participation in further training among workers with disabilities

Purpose:

To analyse the determinants of the participation in further training for workers without and with disabilities in Germany. In particular, we are interested in testing the hypothesis that people with disabilities are less likely to receive further training.

Method:

Using longitudinal data from the German Socio-Economic Panel which covers the period 1989 to 2008, we estimate panel data regression models that allow us to identify the factors affecting the likelihood to participate in further training for people without and with disabilities.

Results:

The results confirm that workers with disabilities are less likely to participate in further training as compared to workers without disabilities (especially among males). In addition, variables such as age, years of education, occupation and firm size have a significant effect on the likelihood to get involved in further training for the disabled sample. We also found that people with disabilities have experienced more intensely the changes and variations in the participation rates over the period analysed compared to people without disabilities.

Conclusions:

From a public policy perspective, these findings show the importance of designing and implementing specific training programs for people with disabilities, which can contribute to maintaining and increasing their integration in the German labour market.

Implications for rehabilitation:

Training and vocational rehabilitation can in many cases be critical to achieve or secure employment. A person becoming disabled may, even after completion of the medical rehabilitation process, not be able to continue to work in the previous occupation. Rehabilitation specialists must be more involved within the design, provision and implementation of further training. They can also help to identify adaptive equipment and specific training tools that contribute to increasing the participation in further training among the disabled population. However, the odds of participating in further training among workers with disabilities is around 17% lower than that registered for their non-disabled counterparts.