Title I Technical Assistance Manual

Substantially Limited in Working

It is not necessary to consider if a person is substantially limited in the major life activity of "working" if the person is substantially limited in any other major life activity.

For example: If a person is substantially limited in seeing, hearing, or walking, there is no need to consider whether the person is also substantially limited in working.

In general, a person will not be considered to be substantially limited in working if s/he is substantially limited in performing only a particular job for one employer, or unable to perform a very specialized job in a particular field.

For example: A person who cannot qualify as a commercial airline pilot because of a minor vision impairment, but who could qualify as a co-pilot or a pilot for a courier service, would not be considered substantially limited in working just because he could not perform a particular job. Similarly, a baseball pitcher who develops a bad elbow and can no longer pitch would not be substantially limited in working because he could no longer perform the specialized job of pitching in baseball.

But a person need not be totally unable to work in order to be considered substantially limited in working. The person must be significantly restricted in the ability to perform either a class of jobs or a broad range of jobs in various classes, compared to an average person with similar training, skills, and abilities.

The regulations provide factors to help determine whether a person is substantially limited in working. These include:

• the type of job from which the individual has been disqualified because of the impairment;

• the geographical area in which the person may reasonably expect to find a job;

• the number and types of jobs using similar training, knowledge, skill, or abilities from which the individual is disqualified within the geographical area; and/or

• the number and types of other jobs in the area that do not involve similar training, knowledge, skill, or abilities from which the individual also is disqualified because of the impairment.

For example: A person would be considered significantly restricted in a "class of jobs" if a back condition prevents him from working in any heavy labor job. A person would be considered significantly limited in the ability to perform "a broad range of jobs in various classes" if she has an allergy to a substance found in most high-rise office buildings in the geographic area in which she could reasonably seek work, and the allergy caused extreme difficulty in breathing. In this case, she would be substantially limited in the ability to perform the many different kinds of jobs that are performed in high-rise buildings. By contrast, a person who has a severe allergy to a substance in the particular office in which she works, but who is able to work in many other offices that do not contain this substance, would not be significantly restricted in working.

For example: A computer programmer develops a vision impairment that does not substantially limit her ability to see, but because of poor contrast is unable to distinguish print on computer screens. Her impairment prevents her from working as a computer operator, programmer, instructor, or systems analyst. She is substantially limited in working, because her impairment prevents her from working in the class of jobs requiring use of a computer.

In assessing the "number" of jobs from which a person might be excluded by an impairment, the regulations make clear that it is only necessary to indicate an approximate number of jobs from which an individual would be excluded (such as "few," "many," "most"), compared to an average person with similar training, skills and abilities, to show that the individual would be significantly limited in working.