Search

This article explored considering information about claimant education as a non-medical factor in determining disability and return-to-work potential. In disability determination processes, such as those used by the United States Social Security Administration (SSA), education is one piece of the vocational profile used to infer whether an individual has the knowledge, skills, and abilities that may indicate readiness for work and adaptability to vocational change. This review addressed a number of questions relevant to the validity and utility of incorporating education as a non-medical factor in disability determinations. The types of skills conferred by education, including the variation in skill sets that exists among individuals who have attained the same level of education (e.g., high school graduates), were explored. The relation among these skills and the skills sought by employers was also explored, as was the relation between education and job performance. Finally, the article reviewed the link between educational attainment and literacy, as well as the literacy demands of the workplace; surveys and methodologies for identifying low-literacy occupations were discussed. A basic finding of the review was that although education and literacy demands in the workplace are increasing, the numbers of jobs in the economy with low and literacy demands and those with high literacy demands are increasing concurrently. Disability evaluators who identify the availability of low-literacy and low-skill jobs must, however, be cautious about the physical demands of work in jobs that are traditionally identified as having low skill requirements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context: Medicaid is a major funder of reproductive health services, including family planning and pregnancy-related care, especially for people with limited income and people of color. Federal Medicaid funds cannot be used for abortion however 16 states allow state Medicaid funds to pay for abortion. In recent years, Illinois and Maine implemented, and West Virginia discontinued, state Medicaid coverage of abortion., Methodology: With retrospective procedure- and patient-level data obtained from clinics in these three states, we used an interrupted time series design, multivariable regression models, and descriptive statistics to assess changes in procedure volume and patients' share of total procedure price (patient price)., Results: In Maine and Illinois, implementing state Medicaid coverage of abortion contributed to an immediate overall increase in abortion access (as seen by a rise in monthly procedure volume at the time of the policy's implementation), a decrease in patient price (by 36% in Maine and 44% in Illinois) after policy implementation as compared to pre-implementation, and overall improved access among people of color. Conversely, when West Virginia discontinued coverage, access to care decreased, patient price increased by 130%, and the share of abortion procedures among people of color decreased., Conclusions: In the fragmented abortion access landscape of the post-Roe era, our study provides new evidence that financial assistance offered through state Medicaid policies that cover abortion may be most helpful to those facing traditional structural inequities to access, while discontinuation of Medicaid coverage of abortion further burdens those already economically marginalized., (© 2024 American Institutes for Research. Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of University of Ottawa.)