Second Look at Reported Racial-Ethnic Employment Differences in the Supported Employment Demonstration

The Supported Employment Demonstration (SED) trial, which studied the effects of individual placement and support (IPS) among individuals initially denied Social Security Administration disability benefits for mental illness, reported racial-ethnic differences in IPS’ effect on employment. Because of high rates of attrition in the SED, this finding warranted further study. The current reanalysis used a subsample with a directly observed measure of competitive employment and less attrition to try to corroborate the reported racial-ethnic differences.

The authors compared self-reported employment (collected via telephone interviews) with observed employment (reported monthly by multidisciplinary teams) among a representative subsample (N=614) of the SED, stratified by race and ethnicity.

The observed competitive employment outcomes showed no significant racial-ethnic differences among those assigned to participate in IPS.

Congruent with previous research, reanalysis based on more complete data and more rigorous outcome measurements implied an absence of racial-ethnic differences in IPS’ effect on observed employment outcomes.