02/19/2026
PROTECTING EMPLOYMENT CHOICE FOR
INDIVIDUALS WITH INTELLECTUAL AND DEVELOPMENTAL DISABILITIES
February 2026
Today’s commensurate wage work center programs for individuals with intellectual and
developmental disabilities (I/DD) are provided in a safe, supportive, and positive educational and
workplace setting, meeting strict licensing standards. Individuals receiving this service have cognitive or psychiatric/behavioral, as well as sometimes physical, disabilities that require extensive accommodations and supports, and often direct and continuous supervision by their professional workplace teams, for them to achieve their vocational and daily living goals in a safe and welcoming environment. Ultimately, commensurate wage work center programs ensure that certain individuals with I/DD have a greater opportunity for employment with the accommodations and supports they need to thrive in the workplace.
Historically referred to as “sheltered workshops,” the term “sheltered” was initially understood to mean “safe and protected.” The term has now been weaponized and used to imply a restrictive or non-inclusive workplace, creating misconceptions about commensurate wage work center programs, which are authorized under Section 14(c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). These programs today are welcoming environments that help ensure that participants with the most significant disabilities are fully included in supportive work environments receiving all the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accommodations they need to be successful consistent with the principles of principles of inclusion,
autonomy, and self-determination protected by the Supreme Court’s decision in Olmstead v. L. C. ex rel. Zimring (1999). They also may be the only available opportunities for meaningful employment for over 100,000 individuals with I/DD who rely on commensurate wage work centers for their employment with extensive accommodations and supports, with significant hardship occurring if they were eliminated.
This briefing document provides an overview of Section 14(c) and commensurate wage. It
provides a description of Section 14(c) programs and why they are critical to preserve work opportunities for individuals with the most significant disabilities. Finally, the document discusses common misconceptions about the program and commensurate wage, introducing the concept of adjusted wage as a means to capture the total value of the wages/funds/services received by a worker in these programs.
SECTION 14(C) AND COMMENSURATE WAGE
For over 80 years, 14(c) programs have offered safe and supportive work environments that allow individuals with significant disabilities to thrive in employment settings that are tailored to their needs, providing them with accommodations and support systems to help them reach their full potential. These
programs have been referred to historically as “sheltered workshops,” but this is an oversimplification.
Originally the term “sheltered” was understood to mean “safe and protected.” The term has now been weaponized and used to imply a restrictive or non-inclusive workplace for individuals with disabilities, which is simply not the case.
Nowadays, 14(c) programs are safe and welcoming environments that help ensure that program participants with the most significant disabilities are fully included in supportive workplace settings receiving all the ADA accommodations they need to be successful. The providers offering these services are referred to as Vocational/ Employment and Home and Community Based providers for individuals with I/DD. Providers have to meet stringent federal and state requirements and monitoring to participate in the program. They offer a range of facility-based and community-based services to individuals with I/DD, including providing much of the competitive integrated employment in many states.
Section 14(c) of the FLSA allows these providers to pay individuals with significantly lower
productivity due to their disability less than the applicable minimum wage for work, based upon a set of highly regulated protocols, which is called a commensurate wage. This amount earned is not simply “sub-minimum” wage, which is an oversimplified and sometimes inaccurate description; rather it represents a
portion of wage specifically measured under a formula based on productivity and other standards. Importantly, individuals can and often do earn more than minimum wage under 14(c) programs.
HOW ARE SECTION 14(C) PROGRAMS DIFFERENT?
Section 14(c) programs offer a vocational setting adapted to meet each participant’s individual challenges. In these programs, each employee with I/DD is receiving ongoing training to help them reach their highest potential. This includes trained staff support and workstations that help them to complete work, along with visual aids, and at times personal care assistance and behavioral intervention, among
other accommodations. The goal is to assist participants in having meaningful employment and, to the extent feasible, transitioning to competitive integrated employment if the individuals with I/DD so choose.
An average day for an employee in a 14(c) program may not be possible to describe. Individuals may have an average day, but the group dynamic and the breadth of the I/DD spectrum make it challenging to speak universally. That is precisely what makes this experience so dynamic and meaningful. Most providers provide employment as packaging and assembly subcontractors. Jobs are brought in, broken down into micro-steps, jigs, and other production aids are created, and employees are
taught how to complete them. Not everyone may have the aptitude needed to complete every step, so the process is segmented to provide access to everyone. Some individuals work with greater independence than others, but for some, assistance and job coaching are a regular part of everyday life.
No matter the job, individual successes are met with cheers. When team goals are achieved, an
announcement is trumpeted over the speakers, and applause echos through the building. Successes come in all sizes, but each is celebrated. It can be raucous in the mornings, pre-shift, and again following the shift as friends greet one another and talk about their evening plans. There may be an activity bus headed
for bowling or a movie. For many, this is visiting time while waiting for transportation home.
WHY ARE SECTION 14(C) PROGRAMS IMPORTANT?
Section 14(c) programs are critical in order to preserve work opportunities for individuals with
the most significant disabilities. In 2025, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that there are approximately 44.7 million people with disabilities in the United States. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, as of 2024, the labor force participation rate for individuals with disabilities was 24.5 percent compared to
62.6 percent for individuals without disabilities. The labor force participation rate is widely
acknowledged to be materially lower for those individuals with the most significant disabilities, who are the individuals that benefit the most from Section 14(c) and would be most impacted by its elimination.
According to the National Disability Institute, approximately 111,471 people with the most
significant disabilities worked for a 14(c) certificate holder in 2019. According to research conducted by UMASS Boston’s Institute for Community Inclusion, more than 90 percent of employees working in 14(c) environments have I/DD. This was confirmed by a survey of community rehabilitation programs,
where the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that most 14(c) workers have I/DD. Data illustrates that individuals with I/DD empirically have the hardest time finding employment and need the most support in maintaining it. Unfortunately for individuals with I/DD who desire to work in a 14(c) environment, the GAO has confirmed that the number of 14(c) employers decreased significantly by about 50 percent from 2010 to 2019–with the number of 14(c) workers decreasing from about 296,000 to
122,000—in part due to state policies restricting wages below the federal minimum.
WHAT ARE SOME MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT SECTION 14(C)?
Recent national movements to try to raise the minimum wage have led to misconceptions about14(c). Unfortunately, that goal has been (inappropriately) intermixed with the elimination of the 14(c)program that allows I/DD work center programs to operate. 14(c) simply does not prevent an individual from making the choice to work in a competitive integrated employment job. The disability community is a large and diverse community, with varying levels of need for supports and accommodations in the
workplace. The disability community should not be treated with a monolithic, one-size fits-all approach. While there is general agreement within the disability community that competitive, integrated employment is the goal for most individuals with disabilities, the reality is that it may not be a realistic and even a desirable goal for everyone. Indeed, individuals with the most significant intellectual and developmental disabilities should have a right to choose a workplace that provides the level of protection,
support, and accommodation needed for them to thrive in a supportive workplace environment.
WHY SHOULD SECTION 14(C) PROGRAMS BE PRESERVED? Consistent with the Supreme Court’s holding in the landmark Olmstead decision, choice is the paramount principle of employment through Section 14(c). No individual need participate in a
commensurate wage program work center who does not wish to participate. If 14(c) is eliminated, organizations offering facility-based services will need to scale these programs down or close entirely, to the detriment of the most vulnerable members of the workforce, who rely on the 14(c) program and have not asked that it be eliminated. This is already happening in states where 14(c) and commensurate wages
have been eliminated. Only a fraction of prior 14(c) participants are now being supported in the community, while those most in need of supports are left unemployed or forced into day habilitation or other services not of their choosing. Without facility-based programs and supports, these individuals would be left at home. A 2025 GAO report titled, “Subminimum Wage Program: Employment Outcomes
and Views of Former Workers in Two States,” examined data from two states that eliminated the use of 14(c), namely, Colorado and Oregon. As of 2023, the GAO found that a minority of the approximately 1,000 people these states were able to track had moved from 14(c) to some other type of employment, including competitive integrated employment. The remaining 54 to 61 percent were not working.
The elimination of 14(c) would also run counter to the spirit and purpose of the ADA. The ADA
requires employers to provide “reasonable accommodations” to employees with IDD, where there is not undue hardship placed on the company. However, the mechanism that assists in preventing undue hardship is Section 14(c) itself. The accommodations needed to support individuals with the most significant disabilities can be extensive and expensive, particularly when combined with lower productivity of workers in 14(c) programs. The elimination of 14(c) would eliminate these jobs to the
detriment of the employees that are in most need of the protections of the ADA and FLSA. It is important to take a different approach that preserves the benefits of the 14(c) program (increased employment for individuals with the most significant disabilities) while addressing concerns. For example, Northern European countries provide a training stipend or subsidy for individuals with reduced work capacity.
RETHINKING COMMENSURATE WAGE: ADJUSTED WAGE
The concept of a commensurate wage was created in Section 14(c) of the FLSA to help workers with significant disabilities who could not work in a competitive integrated environment to be able to work and remain in the workforce. The commensurate wage need not be lower than minimum wage.
However, it is based on a productivity scale that recognizes that some significantly disabled workers cannot work a continuous shift but may need to take frequent breaks while working, so it measures productivity. While typically lower than minimum wage, a commensurate wage also does not fully measure what a worker in a 14(c) program is receiving from an employer and from the government.
The concept of a prevailing wage exists in other areas of employment law, such as construction of government projects by contractors (e.g., the Davis-Bacon Act) or provision of services to the
government by contractors (e.g., the Service Contract Act); a prevailing wage typically includes what the union wage is in an area along with the value of standard fringe benefits provided; the total prevailing wage is a combination of the union wage and the value of the standard fringe benefits.
Although not precisely the same concept, an adjusted wage seeks to measure the total bundle of funds and services a 14(c) worker is receiving so there are similarities with prevailing wage (as more than the wage is being measured, the value of other benefits is included as well). This allows a comparison of
what the worker receives as part of 14(c) in comparison to what that worker would receive in competitive integrated employment. What the adjusted wage concept shows is that a 14(c) worker is not losing compensation by being in 14(c); instead they are receiving more overall in combined funds and services.
For example, a worker with I/DD in a 14(c) program would receive a commensurate wage,
supports and services from the 14(c) employer, and SSI/Medicaid. If the same worker transitioned into competitive integrated employment, the worker would receive a higher monetary wage potentially, but he or she would lose the supports and services from the14(c) employer, and could also potentially lose
SSI/Medicaid. Likewise, if the worker moved out of the workforce into an adult day program, the worker would maintain SSI/Medicaid, but would lose the commensurate wage and other supports/services from the 14(c) provider (although some of these may be replaced by the day program). Importantly, the adjusted wage ultimately shows the total value of the wages/funds/services being received by the worker in a 14(c) program. In assessing or counseling whether a worker would be better situated remaining or moving out of a 14(c) program, it is more just and protective of the interests of the
worker to calculate the total financial impact of the move by using the adjusted wage figure; this
information should be available to workers and their caregivers in helping guide them as to what is in a particular worker’s best interests. Likewise, in assessing whether society would be better off with or without 14(c), it is critical to include the entire value that 14(c) provides to workers with I/DD and their caregivers. When an adjusted wage figure is used, it is as clear as day that 14(c) provides benefits to both workers with I/DD and society at large, and that it would be a grave mistake to eliminate the program.
Adjusted wage would also potentially allow a compromise down the line where workers in 14(c) programs would need to be receiving an adjusted wage over the minimum wage, but it would be the adjusted wage figure that is used instead of the lower commensurate wage. After all, if a worker with I/DD in a 14(c) program is receiving an adjusted wage higher than the minimum wage, they are most certainly being benefited and not harmed by the 14(c) program. Indeed, it is moving a worker with I/DD
against their will to CIE in that circumstance that would be harming the worker financially as well as in terms of personal liberty.
CONCLUSION
The Coalition for the Preservation of Employment Choice was formed to preserve the right of individuals with significant disabilities to be part of the workforce and to choose the setting in which they work. The Coalition maintains that the opportunity to pursue and sustain employment through Section 14(c) should not be taken away against the will of those who benefit the most from the program.
Ultimately, the Coalition believes that Congress should take action to ensure that the most vulnerable members of the workforce, including those with I/DD, are not abandoned by an ill-advised elimination of Section 14(c). There is no doubt that Section 14(c) could be enhanced and improved. To that end, and as discussed above, the Coalition advances the concept of an adjusted wage and remains ready to engage.
Colleen Stuart
Board President, Coalition for the Preservation of Employment Choice
Venango Training & Development Center,
Christopher Brewer
Board Vice President, Coalition for the Preservation of Employment Choice
Executive Director, Project CU, Inc., MASWM
Lisa C. Liston
Board Treasurer, Coalition for the Preservation of Employment Choice
Coordinator of Care
Clelian Heights Inc.
Amy Patz
Board Member, Coalition for the Preservation of Employment Choice
Gail Thibodeau
Board Secretary, Coalition for the Preservation of Employment Choice
Tom O’Brien
Board Member, Coalition for the Preservation of Employment Choice
President / CEO
Industrial Opportunities, Inc.
Anita Bennett
Board Member, Coalition for the Preservation of Employment Choice
