12%

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Some facts about employment among the HFA/Autism community in the UK:

UK National Autistic Society (2001 research)
- 12% of those with HFA or Asperger's were in full time employment

UK office of national statistics (ONS) 2003
- 49% of people with other disabilities were in full time employment
-81% of people who were not disabled were in full time employment

Source: Daniel Tammet's 'Born on a Blue Day' (2007)

That's curious. I wonder why that is?

Maybe work is just too much to handle for us, since we're prone to being overwhelmed anyway.

I'd be interested to know how many of that 12% were "self-employed" and compare it to those with a) other disabilities and b) with those not disabled.

Yet.... I essentially question this statistic.... How many "false diagnoses" were included in the test group?
We can't know that answer... but I think it safe to say that those likely to be misdiagnosed as AS or HFA are likely non-socials. Would it change the statistics? Maybe not, but it does invalidate the results to some extent. That is assuming that there are a good number of misdiagnosed people out there which I believe to be true. And there are a lot of undiagnosed real cases too.

Maybe there's a small number of people in the UK with AS.

Daniel Tammet makes the point that the recruitment process may be a big part of the reason for this.
- Job adverts/descriptions that are confusing or seem to be written in some secret code
- The interview process requires social and communicative skills, areas in which autistic people are clinically impaired

In my case, I've always been able to hold stuff together long enough to get jobs but somewhere in the day-to-day of executing the job something comes through that employers find unappealing so I don't manage to keep jobs for more than a couple of weeks. Some jobs I was given a reason why I was fired, like I packed a bunch of boxes wrong, but most times I was never told why I was being fired so I don't even know what it is about me that puts employers off.

So if I were surveyed during one of those times when I was starting a new job, I'd have been among the 12% but if I'd been surveyed during the time I was looking for my next job, I'd have been among the 88%. For the last 16 years or so, I've been among the 88% but in a few years when I (God willing) finish my doctorate degree, I hope to be back among the 12% again.

that is something the UK should be ashamed of

I don't know about the figures in the Netherlands, but I expect the same pattern more or less

I think it's because most jobs have social demands, and we're not usually the social types. I'm lucky to be cleaning parking lots, as a dustman. No social demands, there.

I usually performed quite well in job interviews.

But like you, I could never hold down a job for very long; although in my case, my jobs were measured in months (or a few years) rather than weeks.

I know exactly why I couldn't hold down a job (occasionally due to being fired)

I don't suffer fools gladly AND I speak my mind freely.

I was also quite bored with my work, as I usually took positions that were beneath my ability.

I'm definitely not a team player when it comes to work so that prevented me taking more senior roles.

Unemployable

I haven't had a paycheck for for about 14 years now, since I started working freelance and then set up my own business.

I remember the stress and anxiety of being an 'employee' (including the many 'sick days' when I just couldn't face going into work )

I'm grateful that I have been able to earn a living without having to be an employee.

I read that the samples used for that data were very small. I did a thread on it a few months ago too, and a few people said that, in fact.

All of the studies tend to hover around that mark. A book that listed all of them ranged from 0% to 36% depending on the study.

It's strange that they don't consider part-time work as employment.

That is a good point Daniel.

There are plenty of people who DO work part time and it seems that this has been a growing trend in the UK in recent years.

Multiple part time jobs (sometimes in addition to a full time job) has been a part of American culture for quite some time now.

I had lots of trouble holding down a good job and before posting this I counted them all up. In a working career of 32 years I had 16 jobs, an average employment length of 2 years. The longest lasted 6 years and the shortest lasted 3 weeks.

Vanilla_Slice

Thanks for sharing this Vanilla

I've just realized that my 'working' career (as an employee) was only 12 years!

I recall at least 12 'jobs' during that time (the longest of which was about 3 years) although I think there were probably a few more , that probably lasted a few weeks or months, that I simply can't remember

That said, I usually moved to a job that paid more money (which softened the anxiety of looking for a new job)!

I can't remember a single job where I wasn't an 'Office Refuser' (unable to face going into work in the morning) at least once!

Looking at these cold numbers, I can see that my employment career was pretty much a train wreck!

Or maby it is the recruiters that represent the companies that are being dicks and corporations are not as forthcomming and friendly as they are trying to project themselves.

Example: Its like this company that i worked for about 2 years ago; they had an online image that did not fit in very well with their "social policy", on their webpage they had a dark skinned dude doing business to show how "ethnically diverse" they were. In real life, 0% of the employees were from outside Europe and their CEO was a Muslim hating racist who revealed himself "in vino veritas". The most "exotic" employee was a white guy from Poland.

Whenever someone in a wheelchair is hired, they make accommodations for that employee, but for ASD's - the invisible handicap? Forget it!

Anyway, i got a new job that doesn't require me to be a brownnose consultant.

Congratulations on the new job.

I never brown-nosed an employer or 'superior'; quite the opposite.

To quote a colleague from my early days of professional employment;

'I've often thought the way you speak, but I never actually HEARD anyone say it before '

He had a drink with me at lunchtime after I was fired in the morning