Challenges Faced by Malaysians with Disabilities in the World of Employment

Authors

  • Tiun Ling Ta School of Social Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang
  • Khoo Suet Leng School of Social Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5463/dcid.v24i1.142

Keywords:

employment, people with disabilities, markets, discrimination, Malaysia

Abstract

Purpose: This paper aims to explore and understand the challenges that are encountered by Malaysians with disabilities in the world of employment.

Methods: A survey was undertaken in four Northern Malaysian states (Perlis, Kedah, Penang and Perak) to obtain the primary data. Two sets of questionnaires were formulated.  The first questionnaire was addressed towards Malaysian people with disabilities, while the second one was for the employers. Descriptive statistics were used to explore, summarise and describe the data collected.

Results: This paper argues that integrating people with disabilities into the mainstream workforce should be the way forward, given that they are a pool of untapped human resources. Crucially, this study also highlights some of the key challenges faced by Malaysian people with disabilities, such as discrimination and exploitation at work.

Conclusions: This paper concludes that equal employment and training opportunities should be extended to Malaysian people with disabilities, in an effort to integrate them into the mainstream workforce. The existing Disability Act 2008 should be revised to address the challenges and issues highlighted in this paper.

Author Biographies

Tiun Ling Ta, School of Social Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang

Dr. Tiun Ling Ta is a trained demographer and his areas of specialization are fertility, age of first marriage, disability access and high-rise residential management. He is a social activist and also a councillor in the local government. He was awarded the National Disabled Worker Award from the Ministry of Human Resources (2002), Penang Disabled Person Award (2003) and also won the disabled person of the year award in 2005.

Khoo Suet Leng, School of Social Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang

Dr. Khoo Suet Leng is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Development Planning and Management, School of Social Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia.  Her areas of specialization are education, training and human resource development.  Suet Leng has undertaken extensive research on human resource development in Malaysia’s formal as well as informal sectors. She has presented her research findings in Malaysia, Australia, America and Japan.

Downloads

Published

2013-05-01

How to Cite

1.
Ta TL, Leng KS. Challenges Faced by Malaysians with Disabilities in the World of Employment. DCIDJ [Internet]. 2013 May 1 [cited 2024 Oct. 18];24(1):6-21. Available from: https://dcidj.uog.edu.et/index.php/up-j-dcbrid/article/view/98

Issue

Vol. 24 No. 1 (2013): Spring

Section

Original Research Articles

License

Copyright (c) 2013 The Author(s)

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

  1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License By-NC-ND 4.0 that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
  2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
  3. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).
Crossref
Scopus
Google Scholar
Europe PMC