VALSTYBĖS PAGALBOS NEĮGALIŲJŲ UŽIMTUMUI VERTINIMAS, REMIANTIS KITŲ ES ŠALIŲ PRAKTIKA

• Published in: Social Inquiry into Wellbeing 2021, Vol.19 (1), p.6-25
• Main Authors: Girlevičienė, Laura, Kvietkauskienė, Alina
• Format: Article
• Language: eng ; lit
• Subjects: EU-Accession / EU-DEvelopment; EU-Legislation; Labor relations; Labour and Social Security Law
• ISSN: 2783-5502; 2783-5502

Countries facing social problems that are related to people with disabilities use a variety of instruments and methods to address them. One such measure is State aid. However, the application of these measures does not always lead to the achievement of public policy goals, the improvement of indicators such as the integration of people with disabilities into the labour market, and the reduction of social exclusion. This paper examines a social problem related not only to the increase in the employment rate of people with disabilities, but also to research on improving the living standards of this group. Lithuania has been promoting the employment of disabled people by providing State support for employing disabled people for more than a decade. It should be noted that this support scheme has remained practically unchanged throughout this period, and is provided to social enterprises where the employment of persons with disabilities provides limited opportunities for participation in society and does not change public attitudes towards persons with disabilities. This employment model shows sluggish progress in the reduction of unemployment and poverty among people with disabilities, and needs to be assessed and adjusted to implement various policy actions and measures. Efforts have been made to reform employment policy for people with disabilities since 2020, but these changes are not yet concrete, and State aid continues to be granted to disabled people employed based on a care-employment model. The impact of these changes may be insignificant in the future, so it is important for the State to fundamentally review the implemented policy based on the practice of other countries. The novelty of this paper and its contribution to science are reflected in the assessment of the effectiveness of the policies implemented by European Union countries in the field of disabled people. The aim of this article is to analyse the practices of other countries in order to develop an effective model for the employment of people with disabilities in the labour market. The analysis of EU countries for the period 2010–2018 is carried out according to the selected indicators, reflecting social exclusion and poverty. This analysis is performed using the SAW method, which integrates the values of the individual criteria of the countries analysed and the weights attributed to them into a single criterion. In this way, the best alternatives are ranked according to the values obtain