Importance of income, participation and social support for the wellbeing of people with disability

Abstract

This paper applies a shadow pricing method to demonstrate the importance, for overall life satisfaction, of participation and social support relative to income, and particularly highlights their value for people with work restrictions due to disability. Using the first nine waves of the HILDA data, the paper shows that with respect to life satisfaction, the shadow costs of unemployment are up to $322,000 of equivalised household income per annum for people with work-limiting disability, compared to $161,000 for otherwise similar people without disability; the shadow price of active club membership is equivalent to $89,000 and $36,000 a year for people with and without work-limiting disability, respectively; and in terms of life satisfaction a one-unit increase of perceived social support is worth $77,000 and $58,000 of income per annum respectively for the two groups. People with not-work-limiting disability are not much different from people without disability in this respect.