The REAL reason 85% of autistic people are unemployed

From the perspective of a late-diagnosed (WHAT), unemployed (WHAT) and pseudo-anarchist AuDHD comedian (WHAT). AND THAT'S THE BOTTOM LINE, BECAUSE STONE COLD SAID SO.

Why are 85% of autistic people unemployed? 

[Boomer enters] 

BECAUSE THIS GENERATION DOESN’T WANNA WORK HARD!! 😤 THEY JUST WANT TO BE TRANSGENDER, EAT HOT CHIP AND CHARGE THEY’RE IPADS !! 🇺🇸🖕🏻‼️

I’ve written and rewritten this article like a hundred times, each more-or-less following the same format. 

“Autistic people struggle with eye contact and being perceived, which can make a job interview feel like a police interrogation.” 

“Autistic people struggle with socializing, which can make a confrontation with a boss feel like being on fire.” 

“Autistic people struggle with sensory issues, which can make sitting under fluorescent lights feel like being shrunken down and roasted in an Easy Bake Oven.” 

I could sit here and list off the symptoms of autism, talking about how each makes it difficult find and maintain a job, but that’s not why you come to Autism After Dark. You come to Autism After Dark for the STONE COLD TRUTH. 

Stone Cold Steve Autism

Job hopping as an autistic person can feel a lot like opening random doors in an episode of Courage the Cowardly Dog. You just know something bad is going to happen. 

Sure, autistic people can struggle with eye contact, socializing, sensory issues, etc.— but I think there’s a deeper story that needs to be told here.

First, some important context. 

There’s a widely circulated statistic out there that says 85% of autistic adults are unemployed. Some argue it’s closer to 40%, but it’s basically impossible to know for sure, unless we force everyone to take an autism assessment at gun point, which I fully support. 

I don’t think this statistic is accurate, since low-support-needs autistic people (like me) tend to slip through the cracks and go undiagnosed, simply because we’re able to get through school and hold down a job “fine.” 

I put “fine” in quotation marks because it’s not something we decide. It’s something that gets decided for us.

My dad: “Ryan’s doing great! He loves his classes and spends a lot of time in nature!”

[Cut to me smoking cigarettes in the woods during school]

Most autistic people I know, whether they have a job or not, are living in a state of chronic burnout. To put it bluntly, their lives are a fucking mess. 

They’ve been so beaten down by relationship trauma, chronic stress, disease, poverty, loneliness and grief— that they’re stuck in a semi-permanent fight-or-flight mode.

32-45% of autistic people meet the diagnostic criteria for PTSD, while the general population hovers around 4-4.5%. That’s not counting the countless others who would qualify for a cPTSD diagnosis, if that hadn’t been stricken from the DSM for political reasons. 

When autistic people say we’ve been through shit, we mean— WE’VE BEEN THROUGH SHIT. 

We keep trying to tell you motherfuckers but nobody wants to listen. 

We’re told that we’re over-dramatic, out of touch, or we just want special treatment. People will invent all kinds of wild theories about why we are the way that we are. They’ll blame us, blame the devil, blame post-modern neo-Marxism— anything but listen to the words coming out of our mouths.  

What our undereye bags and frazzled hair are trying to tell you— is that we have been to hell, we’ve shaken hands with the devil, and it would be super cool if you weren’t a cunt today. 

Neurotypical people do not pick up on this because they’ve never experienced anything like autistic burnout. They have nothing to compare our experience to and don’t understand how rude it is to expect us to be overachievers when we feel like we’re on death’s door. 

Despite what autism moms might try to convince you, autism is not a super power, we are very much disabled. 

The problem with that is…. 

In America, we throw disabled people in the fucking garbage. 

When you get hurt and miss work, a little duck just doesn’t appear out of nowhere to help you out. The bills keep coming, the rent’s still due and most people don’t have rich parents to swoop in and help them. The result? 

31% of homeless people are disabled. That’s not counting the thousands more who are likely neurodivergent, but don’t have access to support and diagnostic services. 

[Boomer enters] 

But those people are receiving disability benefits— MUST BE NICE! 😡 👎🏻‼️

OK, yeah, let’s unpack that nightmare labyrinth. 

Only about 30% of people who apply for disabilities are ultimately accepted and that’s after waiting between seven months and two years (or more) for a decision— during which time you have no income at all. It’s extremely common to be rejected on your first attempt, and after your third appeal, you’re required to meet with a judge and essentially “prove” that you have a disability. Your reward for going through this lengthy and humiliating process? A whopping $1,400 per month, which allows you to afford groceries, utility and rent for a one-bedroom apartment in exactly 0.0% of states. 

It’s no wonder that 900,000 people with disabilities live in institutional settings like nursing homes or psychiatric hospitals, often due to a lack of affordable housing in their area, rather than an actual need for that level of care. 

Unemployed autistics teeter over the edge of the all-devouring pit of homelessness, which is especially scary, considering the nationwide push by lawmakers to criminalize the unhoused. 

Between 2006-2019, 187 cities in all 50 states passed laws increasing city-wide bans on sitting, lying, loitering, panhandling and living in vehicles. If arrested, autistic unhoused people could lose custody of their children, lose their job or be hit with unpayable court fees that result in even more jail time. 

Once they have a criminal record, it becomes harder to find employment, secure housing and receive public benefits— basically throwing their life into a death spiral, all because they weren’t able to contribute to capitalism for a minute. 

This brings us to our second important point: 

America hates vulnerability 

You might be thinking, how could a majority Christian country, as in, followers of Jesus Christ— the guy who gave up his belongings and dedicated his life to helping the poor and sick— let this happen? 

The answer has to do with a centuries-old trope, our fear of death, and an economic system built on narcissistic abuse. 

In America, the Protestant Work Ethic runs deep. During the Industrial Revolution, the ruling class found it politically expedient to push the idea that people’s “goodness” was tied up with their ability to produce, a knot we’re still struggling to untangle to this day. 

Most of us were raised with the idea that the most noble thing you can be is a “hard worker” who puts in “enough effort”— subjective goalposts that are constantly moved by the ruling class to increase profits year over year. 

I’ve worked a lot of physical labor jobs in my day and I can say from experience— 90% of the conversations coworkers have center around this dick measuring contest. It’s always someone bragging about how hard they worked yesterday or complaining about a coworker who doesn’t work hard enough.

They’re crabs, jockeying for position in a boiling pot. 

Rather than putting work in its rightful place— as an activity we do to pay the bills and contribute to our community— it’s instead seen as the ultimate measure of our character. If we’re not willing to completely burn ourselves to the ground and neglect our home life, we must be morally inferior human beings. 

This is where we run into problems in society. Anytime you hold up one value as an ultimate good, its opposite becomes an ultimate bad. As a result, people who struggle to meet the demands of capitalism because of a disability are met with shame instead of compassion. 

From the autistic experience, it feels like everybody hates us, and they do. We just have to take it a level deeper to understand why. 

Deep within our country’s shadow is a paralyzing fear of vulnerability and death. The Protestant Work Ethic gives us a solution to this: Simply work harder and you won’t feel vulnerable anymore. 

Anybody who’s ever worked a dead-end job knows this isn’t true, that the ruling class will gladly chew us up and spit us out and we’ll have nothing to show for it in the end— but no matter how much you explain this to people, you’ll always get the same response from capitalists: Work harder. 

The onus is always shifted onto the individual, because if it wasn’t, the billionaire class would have to take accountability for the vulnerable people they allow to suffer every day as a direct result of their greed. 

That greed comes from the same cultural messaging. Work longer. Push harder. More! More! More! 

It’s a system of infinite growth on a planet of finite resources— the consequences of which we’re only just beginning to feel. 

The truth is, we have more than enough surplus to cover the basic necessities of people— we just choose to not do that because it would send “the wrong message.” 

That message being, “It’s OK to be vulnerable.” 

When employers see an autistic person who’s burnt out, overwhelmed, socially awkward and seeking accommodations— they react defensively. 

Why? 

Because our vulnerability reminds them of their vulnerability. It reminds them that they’re one slip-and-fall, one car accident, or one diagnosis away from being vulnerable, too. It illuminates the largest flaw of their worldview, it exposes their lack of empathy— and they don’t like that shit at all. 

So they double down. They shake off their temporary sanity and slide back into that comfortable brain groove of blaming people for their problems. It’s easier to do that than to admit that me, everyone I know, and the entire system I support are wrong and actively harmful. 

The system artificially inflates the egos of people who find success, and sentences unsuccessful people to a lifetime of shame and servitude to the successful. It’s a self-sustaining ecosystem that’s maintained through narcissistic abuse. 

Capitalism is a pyramid scheme built on narcissistic abuse 

Anyone who’s ever spent time around a narcissist can see how our economic system is essentially built on the same principles of control. Within capitalism: 

• The business owner has ultimate power

• They keep the vast majority of the profit for themselves, but call you greedy and entitled if you ask for your fair share (it’s all projection) 

• They will mock, ignore and gaslight you if you have a problem with this arrangement 

• Nothing is ever capitalism’s fault, the onus is always on you to change for capitalism 

• Just like a narcissist, the goal of capitalism is reputation management and self-preservation, not the goodwill of humanity 

Businesses would discriminate against disabled people if there wasn’t a law against it, because people only care about money and their own ambitious advancement. 

Even with protective laws in place, many employers still treat them like suggestions. 

The truth is, they don’t want to give you a seat at the table, because in their mind, you don’t deserve it. They need to maintain that power dynamic because it makes you easier to manipulate. If they start treating you like a human now, they might have to treat you like a human later, which might interfere with MAXIMUM COMPANY EFFICIENCY. 

The only way to defeat these people is through collective action, but as I look around the room, I see defeat in the faces of my comrades. Instead of feeling indignant at the injustice of all, they feel apathy at best and contempt for me at worst. I’m on the outskirts again— a feeling with which I’m all too familiar.

That feeling of UNANIMOUS REJECTION is the beginning of the end for me at most jobs. I lose interest. I stop talking to my coworkers. I disassociate all day and self-harm at night. I stop showing up. I quit. I get fired. Who cares. 

I’ll limp away, wounded and ashamed, just like all those other times— spam applying for jobs on Indeed and compulsively DoorDashing to survive, limping from Taco Bell to house on my one good leg. 

Why does this keep happening to me? 

It took me 30 years to figure out the answer: 

I have autism. 

Yet when I disclose this— and ask for the reasonable accommodations entitled to me according to the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act— they hide behind “company policy” and bet I don’t have enough money to afford a lawyer. Which, of course I don’t, because all I can get with my sordid reference list and gaping employment gaps are dead-end entry level jobs. 

They tell me what I wanna hear to make me go away and resolve the matter by changing nothing. 

A clear message is sent: My needs will be ignored, my boundaries will be crossed and there’s nothing I can fucking do about it. 

That’s when I tend to Irish-Goodbye into the shrubbery like an autistic Homer Simpson. 

My resume

I don’t have a job because there are certain boundaries I won’t let people cross. 

• I won’t be abused. 

• I won’t be manipulated. 

• I won’t allow people to openly disrespect me.

Nothing makes a narcissist more angry than when you don’t allow them to set the parameters of your existence. They’ll throw a tantrum, try to intimidate you, punish you— get ready to see their teeth. 

As a child, this meant getting sent to the principal’s office, grounded or physically beaten. 

As an adult, this means taking away your access to food and housing, putting you in jail or just fucking killing you. 

We autistics, being the ever-present pattern recognizers that we are, see this power dynamic playing out negatively over and over again. Whether we have the words to articulate it or not, we know deep down that something is wrong with this system. 

After years of feeding ourselves into the same wood chipper over and over again, we eventually reach a sobering conclusion: That our basic needs will likely always be in limbo. That we might never be able to generate enough momentum to dig ourselves out of this hole. That it’ll always end in a meltdown and us getting fired or quitting. The wood chipper will do what the wood chipper does. 

Eventually, we realize it’s not worth it to destroy ourselves for people who have shown us zero empathy— and many of us lose interest in finding a career. 

Instead of masking to make sociopaths like us, we decide instead to not work, work part-time, or just do the bare minimum to get by. We cobble together a hodgepodge of side-gigs, sell feet pics or become the Rick Harrison of our local Facebook marketplace. Anything to not have another boss. 

So yeah, boomers, it’s partially a choice, but if that’s all you call it, you’re leaving out a TREMENDOUS AMOUNT OF CONTEXT 🇺🇸 📚‼️

That’s like saying fish don’t shop for their own groceries because they’re lazy. Not only are you wrong, you’re wrong twice. You’re wrong in thinking you know what we want, and you’re wrong in thinking you know our capacity. You are two full degrees of separation away from reality. 

Also, it’s a choice we’re making because hanging out with boomers makes us so goddamn miserable we literally have meltdowns and want to kill ourselves. That’s fucking embarrassing FOR YOU. 

You want more autistic people to work? 

Stop being ignorant fascists. 

Autistic people are just the canaries in the coal mine. Once the rest of the country wakes up, stops hating themselves and realizes their power, we’ll be able to create a world that actually reflects our values. 

Until then, if I have that deep gut feeling about a job, I won’t hesitate. I’ll hit that dusty trail one more time, because doubting myself is what got me into this mess and advocating for myself is the only way I’m getting out. 

When I feel those autumn breezes shifting, I’ll hop back in the saddle and ride off into the sunset while the credits play…

And my wife, buried in a comically-oversized pile of bills on the couch next to me, will poke her head out, remote in hand, and say: 

“How about another episode?”