What can the vocational rehabilitation program do to help people with disabilities start their own businesses?

While self-employment has always been a permissible employment outcome under the Rehabilitation Act, as amended (Act), two recent reports, one by the Twenty-Fourth Institute on Rehabilitation Issues (1998) and the other by the Presidential Task Force on Employment of Adults with Disabilities (November 15, 1998), concluded that self-employment outcomes are an underutilized and potentially productive (given the changing nature of the U.S. workforce) source of employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities. These reports found that technological advances, especially in the areas of computers and telecommunications, have removed many of the obstacles that previously hampered individuals with disabilities from successfully entering self-employment. The language in the Rehabilitation Act Amendments of 1998 regarding self-employment, telecommuting and establishing a small business makes it clear that Congress intends these employment outcomes to be available in assisting ...  more