Making Sense of Health-Related Labor-Market Exits and Disability: Evidence from the American Voices Project

Issues around stigma and deservingness may be particularly salient for people who stop working due to health-related reasons. Although historically those experiencing disability have been viewed as “deserving” of assistance, disability has also been stigmatized. Using the American Voices Project data and narrative and discourse analysis methods, we ask how those with a health-related labor-market exit make sense of their exit. We find that respondents use various words to describe themselves with respect to their exit and that they use legitimization strategies when discussing why they do not work.