Washington, U.S.A. — About 56.7 million people (19 percent of the population) had a disability in 2010, according to a broad definition of disability, with more than half of them reporting the disability was severe, according to a comprehensive report on this population released today by the U.S. Census Bureau.

The report, Americans with Disabilities: 2010, presents estimates of disability status and type and is the first such report with analysis since the Census Bureau published statistics in a similar report about the 2005 population of people with disabilities. According to the report, the total number of people with a disability increased by 2.2 million over the period, but the percentage remained statistically unchanged. Both the number and percentage with a severe disability rose, however. Likewise, the number and percentage needing assistance also both increased.

“This week, we observe the 22nd anniversary of the Americans With Disabilities Act, a milestone law that guarantees equal opportunity for people with disabilities,” said Census Bureau demographer Matthew Brault. “On this important anniversary, this report presents a barometer of the well-being of this population in areas such as employment, income and poverty status.”

The statistics come from the Survey of Income and Program Participation, which contains supplemental questions on whether respondents had difficulty performing a specific set of functional and participatory activities. For many activities, if a respondent reported difficulty, a follow-up question was asked to determine the severity of the limitation, hence, the distinction between a “severe” and “nonsevere” disability. The data were collected from May through August 2010. Disability statistics from this survey are used by agencies — such as the Social Security Administration, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and the Administration on Aging — to assist with program planning and management.

The report shows that 41 percent of those age 21 to 64 with any disability were employed, compared with 79 percent of those with no disability. Along with the lower likelihood of having a job came the higher likelihood of experiencing persistent poverty; that is, continuous poverty over a 24-month period. Among people age 15 to 64 with severe disabilities, 10.8 percent experienced persistent poverty; the same was true for 4.9 percent of those with a nonsevere disability and 3.8 percent of those with no disability.

Other highlights:

• People in the oldest age group ─ 80 and older ─ were about eight times more likely to have a disability as those in the youngest group ─ younger than 15 (71 percent compared with 8 percent). The probability of having a severe disability is only one in 20 for those 15 to 24 while it is one in four for those 65 to 69.
• About 8.1 million people had difficulty seeing, including 2.0 million who were blind or unable to see.
• About 7.6 million people experienced difficulty hearing, including 1.1 million whose difficulty was severe. About 5.6 million used a hearing aid.
• Roughly 30.6 million had difficulty walking or climbing stairs, or used a wheelchair, cane, crutches or walker.
• About 19.9 million people had difficulty lifting and grasping. This includes, for instance, trouble lifting an object like a bag of groceries, or grasping a glass or a pencil.
• Difficulty with at least one activity of daily living was cited by 9.4 million noninstitutionalized adults. These activities included getting around inside the home, bathing, dressing and eating. Of these people, 5 million needed the assistance of others to perform such an activity.
• About 15.5 million adults had difficulties with one or more instrumental activities of daily living. These activities included doing housework, using the phone and preparing meals. Of these, nearly 12 million required assistance.
• Approximately 2.4 million had Alzheimer’s disease, senility or dementia.
• Being frequently depressed or anxious such that it interfered with ordinary activities was reported by 7.0 million adults.
• Adults age 21 to 64 with disabilities had median monthly earnings of $1,961 compared with $2,724for those with no disability.
• Overall, the uninsured rates for adults 15 to 64 were not statistically different by disability status: 21.0 percent for people with severe disabilities, 21.3 percent for those with nonsevere disabilities and 21.9 percent for those with no disability.

In addition to the statistics from this report, the Census Bureau also produces annual disability estimates from the American Community Survey (ACS). While the ACS uses a different definition of disability than in this report, it is capable of producing estimates of the population with disabilities at subnational geographies like states, counties, places and metropolitan areas. The Census Bureau has been collecting data about certain disabilities since 1830, when Congress added questions to the census on difficulty hearing, seeing and speaking.

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The U.S. Border Control, Border Control Foundation and other organizations received the consent of the Clerk of the House of Representatives to file amicus curiae briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court supporting an effort to prevent the Obama Administration from using a flawed 2010 Census that included foreign nationals in the count to alter radically the allocation of political power in the United States.

The amicus brief was filed in support of the State of Louisiana’s motion to file an original complaint against the Secretary of Commerce who oversees the Census Bureau.  Louisiana took this unusual step of bypassing U.S. District Courts and filing this action directly in the U.S. Supreme Court due to the critical urgency to obtain a swift ruling.

In a shameful attempt to manipulate the census for political advantage, the Obama’s Census Bureau chief falsely claimed that the Constitution compels him to count ”everyone living in this country, regardless of immigration or citizenship status.”

The Census Bureau unlawfully counted illegal aliens and the President reported these flawed Census results to the House of Representatives as the basis to reapportion the House.

“The result of this corrupted census would be to reward those states that provide “sanctuary” and taxpayer funded benefits to illegal aliens with additional seats in the House of Representatives, while punishing those states that observe the Constitution and the rule of law,” said Edward I. Nelson, U.S. Border Control Chairman.

“If allowed to go uncontested, the State of Louisiana’s filing demonstrates that Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Ohio, and North Carolina would lose one representative each, while California and Texas would each gain two seats and Florida one.  Even worse, since representation in the Electoral College is based, in part, on the number of seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, the composition of the electoral college will also be significantly altered.

“In a close race for the White House, this politicized and illegal census could deliver the presidency to the candidate that most favors illegal aliens, by giving additional electoral college votes to states like California.” said Nelson.

In addition to using the Constitution as the basis for our arguments, we also used a 1990 Supreme Court opinion that states emphatically that persons who enter our country in violation of the law are not entitled to the rights guaranteed to “the People.”  If illegal aliens are not entitled to the rights of the American people, then they should not be counted in the Census, not have their illegal presence effect reapportionment or the electoral college.

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Among fathers with a wife in the workforce, 32 percent were a regular source of care for their children under age 15, up from 26 percent in 2002, the U.S. Census Bureau have reveal in a new report. Among these fathers with preschool-age children, one in five fathers was the primary caregiver, meaning their child spent more time in their care than any other type of arrangement.

The series of tables titled Who’s Minding the Kids? Child Care Arrangements: Spring 2010 showed that in a typical week, 12.2 million (61 percent) of the 20 million children under age 5 were in some type of regular child care arrangement. As married women have increasingly moved into the labor force, fathers have become more available for child care while their wives are working.

“A recession may force families to adjust their child care arrangements,” said Lynda Laughlin, a family demographer at the Census Bureau. “It can trigger unemployment or changes in work hours, thus increasing the availability of fathers to provide child care. It also can reduce available income to pay for child care outside of the home.”

The tables provide statistics on child care arrangements of preschoolers and grade-schoolers by various demographic characteristics of the employed and non-employed mothers. They also examine the characteristics of children who care for themselves on a regular basis as well as how the cost of weekly child care varies based on selected family characteristics.

Other highlights:

• In households with working moms, family members continue to serve as an important source of child care for preschoolers. In spring of 2010, 30 percent of preschoolers were regularly cared for by their grandparents, 29 percent were cared for by their fathers, and 12 percent received care from a sibling or other relative.

• Preschoolers with employed black and Hispanic mothers were more likely to be cared for by their grandparents than their fathers. Twenty-nine percent of black preschoolers were cared for by their grandparents, while a quarter (22 percent) were cared for by their fathers. A third of Hispanic preschoolers were regularly taken care of by their grandparent, compared with 29 percent who received care from their fathers.

• Among preschoolers of employed non-Hispanic white mothers, 30 percent were cared for by their fathers and 29 percent were cared for by their grandparents.

• Of the 21 million mothers who were employed in the spring of 2010, one-third reported they paid for child care for at least one of their children.

• Families with an employed mother and children younger than 15 paid an average of $138 per week for child care in 2010, up from $81 in 1985 (in constant 2010 dollars), the first year that these data were collected.

• Mothers with children under age 5 were more likely to make child care payments than mothers who only had children between the ages of 5 and 14 (47 percent and 23 percent, respectively).

• Families in poverty who paid for care in 2010 spent a greater proportion of their monthly income on child care than did families at or above the poverty line (40 percent compared with 7 percent).

• Among all children, self-care was much more prevalent among middle school-age children than among those in elementary schools: 10 percent of ages 5 to 11 and 30 percent of ages 12 to 14 regularly cared for themselves.

This report is one of several related to children and families to have been released recently or that will be released soon by the Census Bureau, including Custodial Mothers and Fathers and Their Child Support: 2009; Maternity Leave and Employment Patterns of First-Time Mothers: 1961-2008; and Comparing Program Participation of TANF and non-TANF Families Before and During a Time of Recession.

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