A Literature Survey on the Additional Costs of Living for People with Disabilities

The existing literature estimating the additional costs of living faced by people with disabilities is still scarce, despite its relatively long existence. At the moment, existing studies have focused mainly on EU, Anglo-Saxon countries, Malaysia, the Philippines, Ghana, Vietnam, Cambodia, one state in India, sub-Saharan Africa, and China. This limited geographical coverage provides certain estimates for a large fraction of the OECD countries, along with non-representative samples from most other countries, leaving behind more than 75% of the countries worldwide. The main disadvantage of the scarcity of studies relates to the difficulty in estimation and the unavailability of data on disability and related costs. This study surveys the literature on the additional costs of living for people with disabilities. It summarizes the models of disability, the categorization of different costs, the cost assessment methods, and the reasons for difficulty in measuring/estimating costs. We present all studies in the literature received estimating the additional costs of living for people with disabilities, along with the methods used and the geographical areas investigated. The main conclusions drawn from the present survey point to significant additional costs of living for people with disabilities, depending on the type and intensity of disability, which in all cases are not less than 20% of household income, and increase significantly depending on the specifics.