With the recent passing of Senator Ted Kennedy, much has been memorialized as to his lifelong commitment to service and his contributions to equality, access and civil rights for all Americans. After nearly a half century of service to his country, the resulting landscape of progress is reflected in the continuing civil rights advancements enjoyed by people with disabilities. 

As president Obama has recently stated, “virtually every major piece of legislation to advance the civil rights, health and economic well-being of the American people bore his name and resulted from his efforts. His ideas and ideals are stamped on scores of laws and reflected in millions of lives,” particularly anyone with a disability.  Sometimes looking back on an individual’s life time of service helps to illustrate just how far a nation has come in advancing opportunity for Americans, particularly people with disabilities. 

The passing of the Rehabilitation, Americans with Disabilities, and Individuals with Disabilities Educations Acts all provide testament to how change is not just coming but has been in process for four decades.  Such visionary groundwork has lead to subsequent legislation and thought, supporting the development of programs to include people with disabilities in asset building programs.  After all, forty years ago, who ever heard of building wealth for people with disabilities?

However, today by working together, these programs, legislation and strategies exist specifically to assist people with disabilities to increase their employment, economic security and health care outcomes.  There undoubtedly remains much work to be accomplished in the arenas of public policy and education.  However, many disability asset building strategies, tools and opportunities remain woefully under utilized by both the disability and asset building communities.

It is precisely this lack of awareness which often leads to the erroneous conclusion that once benefits such as Social Security Income (SSI) or Medicaid are received, it is nearly impossible for the individual to save or earn additional dollars without threatening those often hard won resources.  Generations have logically responded to this teaching, resulting in the current employment and economic numbers within the disability community.  As we work together to build layered and leveraged strategies to best serve people with disabilities, we now recognize the necessity to treat public benefits as planning opportunities rather than financial encumbrances.  In this way, with the disability and asset building communities working together, we can begin to change the economic expectation of people with disabilities.

This particular issue of EQUITY focuses on specific institutions, programs and tools serving people with disabilities.  Asset building, financial education and access to alternative financing products are all available to people with disabilities.  Dedicated, wickedly smart advocates and service providers in both the disability and asset building community have been working for years to bring this message of financial hope and inclusion to millions of people with disabilities, yet many of the simplest tools still remain under utilized.

For example, a federally funded Individual Development Account provides a person with a disability receiving benefits a unique opportunity to save and build assets.  A federally funded IDA provides participants with an income and asset disregard for purposes of Supplemental Social Security income (SSI).  That is earned income contributed to a federally funded IDA (including the program match), are not counted as income for purposes of the SSI earned income calculation.  Similarly, the accumulated savings in a federally funded IDA account are not considered a resource for purposes of the SSI asset calculation and thus not subject to the $2,000 dollar limit ($3,000 for married couples).

The similarly underutilized Plan to Achieve Self Support (PASS) allows an individual receiving SSI to save income to fund items needed to obtain a vocational goal.  By placing earned income into a PASS, recipients may be able to maximize their SSI benefit, while building assets to fund education, vocational training or a small business.

The Student Earned Income exclusion allows a person who is under age 22 and regularly attending school to exclude earnings from the SSI income calculation.  For calendar year 2009, a qualified individual may exclude up to $1,640 per month with an annual maximum of $6,600.  This exclusion is applied prior to any other exclusion and provides an individual the opportunity to work and gain valuable experience without fearing loss of their income benefit.

Each of the foregoing represents a powerful planning tool for a person with a disability wanting to build a more secure financial future.  That said, it is the combination of these opportunities, used in unison, which can provide dramatic effect for wealth building purposes.  What if the college student, qualifying for the earned income exemption, started a 3/1 home purchase IDA account, while she also funded a PASS to start her own business?  With such planning, we see the possibilities, we see the potential, and we see the future.

The recitation of these three planning tools is meant to be illustrative and only represent a small piece of available strategies.  Each of these programs utilization rates are very low, and simply put, a paucity of those who could benefit participate.  Further, it is critical to acknowledge that a large percentage of the disability population remains unaware of the existence of such elementary programs and tools.  It is incumbent upon both the asset building and disability community to recognize the necessity to actively promote such leveraged planning opportunities.  The demonstration of how even minimum earned income can be multiplied by these tools into actual long-term wealth can provide a transformative experience to the uninitiated.

Following the passing of Senator Kennedy, it seems an appropriate time to re-dedicate ourselves to the shared commitment to make a difference in the lives of others.  It is up to all of us in the disability and asset building communities now more than ever to act to facilitate change.  As Senator Kennedy liked to say, everyone can make a difference. “You don’t have to be a senator, congressman or president to provide change.  All that's required on your part is a willingness to make a difference."  And when Ted Kennedy makes this point, he also tells a story as elegantly simple as it is profound. 

An old man walking along a beach at dawn saw a young man picking up starfish and throwing them out to sea. "Why are you doing that?" the old man inquired.  The young man explained that the starfish had been stranded on the beach by a receding tide and would soon die in the daytime sun.  "But the beach goes on for miles," the old man said.  "And there are so many.  How can your effort make any difference?"  The young man looked at the starfish in his hand, and without hesitating, threw it to safety in the sea.  He looked up at the old man, smiled and said:  "It will make a difference to that one."

Today, right now, choose to make a difference. Tell someone new about IDA accounts, tell someone else about the power of the PASS, tell someone else about EQUITY and how people with disabilities are building wealth.  Tell them all how together we can change the economic expectation of people with disabilities.