Out of Sorts: An intersectional analysis of disabled men's and women's workplace outcomes

This study builds on previous research that demonstrated that disabled men and racial/ethnic minority men are more likely than non-disabled white men to work in female-dominated occupations, while at the same time not reaping the same privileges in those occupations as non-disabled white men do. Using an intersectional approach and a large, nationally representative dataset, this study explores how race, gender, and disability intersect to sort workers into occupations. It also examines how advantage and disadvantage cluster with regards to income inequality within and across occupation types. My research finds that disability has an impact on how people are sorted into occupations; however, that impact varies with race as well as by gender. In addition, disability leads to income disadvantages for disabled white men, but has no additional impact on the earnings of white women and racial/ethnic minority men and women. Race has a larger impact on the earnings of racial/ethnic minority men than on racial /ethnic minority women; the latter are already disadvantaged based on their gender. Class, measured by education and professional occupation, had the strongest impact on workplace outcomes both occupation and income for Hispanic men.