How come people with Aspergers can't work ?

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Because there's a common misunderstanding for Aspies - NT employers seem to think that just because an applicant is an Aspie, it means they are stupid and won't do the work properly and is unable to talk to people.....even though the Aspie has sat through an interview and was successful in the interview just like any NT. Also NT employers seem to think that all NT employees are reliable and all will do their work effectively, and non-NTs are all useless.

In my book, that is not true. Not all NTs are reliable, not all Aspies are slow and unable to talk to people.

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Employers won't employee someone who they think is unrealiable, regardless of whether they are aspie or not. The way they check that, is through references and your job history.

I think your overestimating the average employers understanding of AS. Very few will even know what it is, so are unlikely to make any real judgement on your diagnosis.

They will judge you on your job history, skills, experience and how you come across during the interview.

Jason.

People with aspergers can work. I suspect the author of the original article was not an aspie. Really, aspies are great employees---but they/we need to find work that is a good fit for our talents/ strengths/weaknesses. The best job I ever had was a drafting job in the rural town of a sparsley populated rural county in Arizona. Just a quiet office, me and the other drafter (we were both females!). Loved that job. (drafting maps for the county highway dept.)

it was quiet. It was a work-at-your-own-pace job. No pressure. Almost no interruptions during the day. And I love geography---so it really hit the spot.

This is a refreshingly honest post. I understand why you don't want to work ... I think given the chance we would all prefer to spend our time with our special interests. Work doesn't necessarily have to be dull and if you can get a job that includes your special interests then even better. If you can't ... Well what I do is remind myself that working not only allows me to buy food and keep a roof over my head, it also provides the cash to enable me to pursue my interests. Works for me anyway.

I agree with you 100%. You have some serious balls posting this here, given how others who had similar sentiments were bashed. I have AS, RA and a broken leg that's never healed properly, causing constant pain and I work. It's not an excuse for me not to work. My grandfather was badly injured in WWII and he never whined about not being able to do something because of his mangled leg. Therefore, I have no right to. There are people with far more problems than me working, ergo I have no right to be anything less than self-supporting. Disability is for those who are too disabled to work (yes, that goes for those with ASDs as well-so don't for one second think I'm not including them as being possibly too disabled to work; just not all of them), not for those who can work, but choose to use the label of a minor disability.

Amiin! I admire your honesty. The last post on this topic ended up degenerating into a flame war against me and you because we dare speak our minds.

The issue is not that you "dare to speak your minds" but that you appear to impose standards you apply to yourself to others who may have difficulties you are not aware of or do not understand. For example, you present yourself as having "AS, RA, and a broken leg that's never healed properly" and that you work despite being in pain all the time. This is not a virtuous stance. It's your right to have that stance, but others may find that work is exhausting and leaves them more debilitated, whatever their diagnoses, and that in order to keep their peace of mind and avoid periods of decompensation, they can't work, or at least can't work in a more traditional line of work.

You do not and cannot know other people's circumstances to determine for them whether or not they can work. ooo at least is quite intrusive in the way he imposes his standards on other posters (such as Sweetleaf, whom he was berating yesterday for saying she does not think she can hold down a job). I often encounter attitudes similar to yours directed at me, as if I just gave up on the idea of working for no reason and never really tried, but I spent my entire adult life trying and it left me exhausted, in worse pain, and caused periods of decompensation during which I lost functioning and capability to take care of myself. Given the choice, I won't go back into the workforce because doing so has been harmful to me every single time. But that history doesn't matter when someone goes off about how people should be more willing to work.

Your comparison to your grandfather's situation is also meaningless. His situation was his, and he chose to deal with it as he did. My maternal grandfather also had injuries that never properly healed and left him unable to work a regular job. Instead of just staying at home, he found ways to keep busy on his farm, and he didn't complain about being in pain. But he also accepted his monthly disability payments because he accepted that he was in no shape to work.

I think if people who made the arguments that you and ooo and cavendish make were less inclined to intruding into other people's business and telling others that they should be more willing to work because disability is for people who are "really unable to work" that y'all would generate significantly less strife.

Personally, I find the perspective you three espouse to be actively harmful, and it sometimes leads to browbeating or outright bullying.

It's harmful in the sense that it pushes people to work harder than they can sustain to prove they're not lazy or otherwise morally flawed and leaves them in even worse shape when they overdo it. This is something I have personally experienced.

I think everyone should try their hardest to be as independant as possible, for their own good. Because otherwise you won't be treated like a human being, as long as others have leverage against you.

BUT. I think if you're going to hassle somebody about a job, especially somebody you don't really know, you should be willing to hire them. If you don't have the ability or desire to do that, you're just expecting somebody else to, when you yourself aren't prepared to. Talk is cheap.

I know I can work. I can do anything, but I will just struggle more in positions like cash handling (due to poor maths skills) and talking to customers (due to poor social skills).

I guess some people function better in stressful environments than others. Not all jobs require the same energy and concentration, though, so some are easier to cope with than others.
There are plenty of people with Aspergers who work, so I believe it's a bit of a generalization.

From my own experience, though, I have tried several jobs, but found that with a complete lack of concentration, very little social skills and severe tics which worsen away from my home environment made it very difficult for me to do my job properly. I never quit, though, but was fired from pretty much every job because of my "eccentricities".

Doing volunteer work was different however, since I was able to choose what I would be more comfortable doing, I usually got jobs away from people, but in an actual paying job it's not really a pick and choose.

I can function well when I'm out, so I think I would be OK in a paid job. I know I get highly anxious when I'm out in public but that still doesn't really affect my behaviour and concentration. I am rather adaptable too, so even when I'm somewhere where I'm really uncomfortable, I still don't show it.

I can relate.....it's probably what everybody wants, to spend their life doing exactly what they feel like doing. And Aspies have a particular problem in resisting the temptation to do just that.

Problem is, it's not going to happen. When I told my teacher that I wished I was at home playing with my mice, he just lectured me in front of the whole class about what would happen to me if my wish was granted - I'd not be equipped for life in the real world and the only thing I would have learned would be a few interesting but useless facts about mice.

So unless you've got a stash of money somewhere, or a secure welfare income (fat chance of that in today's political climate where the disabled are being thrown back into the non-disabled jobs market!), there will probably have to be a compromise. My greatest help has been to live frugally and save the extra cash so that I won't need to go to work for such a long time. Watch out for voluntary severance deals - one of those could finance you for a year or two. Also, try to work locally so that you don't waste a couple of hours a day commuting (though commuting by public transport might suit some Aspies if their special interest involves working at a laptop etc.). Try to find a job like the one Einstein had - he achieved his employer's targets (accountancy?) very quickly and sat there quietly working on his special interest in the time he'd saved.

The other thing that's helped me a lot is that I discovered I could sometimes turn their work demands into some kind of a special interest. It's hard to believe when they first give you a role, that you could ever enjoy it, but I've often found that once my initial rage has subsided, I then begin to co-opt the role, to make it my own. This involves taking as much control over the process as possible.....employers usually don't like this but they'll probably tolerate it if you can show them it gets results. I make de facto changes in the methodology where I see fit, and I don't necessarily run my changes past the bosses, in case they don't like my ideas. Of course it's down to me to make sure my changes won't harm the results or I'll be wide open for a justifiable carpeting. So ultimately I'm working more like a self-employed person, with my own ways of doing things, and that suits my Aspie brain a lot better than prostituting my executive faculty ever could.

But if you do manage to lig your way out of employment heartache, please don't forget that the world is in rather a mess and is crying out for people to help set it straight. So if you possibly can, find some kind of philanthropy that you can do (on your own terms of course), and try to leave the world a better place than it was when you arrived in it.

Well I see your point, but honestly I would say its those who would treat someone as less than human for not being totally independent and self sufficient are in the wrong, not the person who cannot function well enough to do so.

As a kid, from age 13 to 21, I worked each summer for 45 days in a row, thats was no problem at all. As an adult I worked 2 years at one place, and 2 years at another, but these days with severe depression and social anxiety disorder as comorbids, I can't work. Hopefully I can work again in the future.

Due to social interaction problems people with aspie are unable to hold onto jobs
they are able to work but they are unable to sustain longer especially in jobs which require social interaction
and communication