Our Impact

“They just don’t have energy to keep fighting,” says Debora Wagner, work incentives associate at the Yang-Tan Institute on Employment and Disability, about people with mental health disabilities whose application for disability benefits is denied by the Social Security Administration.

“This kind of work … satisfies not only the needs of job seekers who are autistic, but really helps the economy,” said Susanne Bruyère, academic director of the Yang-Tan Institute on Employment and Disability, when commenting on a federal cut to a study on employment barriers for autistic job seekers.

Now in its fifth year, the 2024-25 New York at Work report draws on ILR expertise, research-based data and policy analysis on a broad range of key issues affecting the state’s workers, unions, communities and employers.

Sarah von Schrader, director of research and program evaluation at the Yang-Tan Institute in the ILR School, comments on a proposed rule from the Department of Labor to end a required disability hiring goal for federal contractors.

Susanne Bruyère shares how engaging businesses can help to identify, reach, train, and support disabled populations who may have been previously overlooked to empower talent and provide them with employment opportunities.

In an episode of the Cornell Keynotes podcast from eCornell, Susanne Bruyère, academic director of the Yang-Tan Institute on Employment and Disability, discusses the growing number of corporate affirmative hiring programs to recruit individuals who are neurodivergent.