The Shape of the Problem
http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2010/07/03/theshapeoftheproble/Feministe
7/3/10
What I wanted to talk about today is employment. I am currently unemployed, and have known very few trans people offline who weren't in the same situation. It's difficult to really get a true sense of the employment situation for trans people, since most studies are small, and few if any actually separate the sexes (which would give us a much clearer picture of who in our community is unemployed). But here's what we can say for sure: compared to the general population, it's really bloody awful.
A survey on the subject was recently released by New York trans group Make the Road. There were a few key findings in that report, but the most shocking one was that 49% of their 82 transgender respondents had never been offered a job while living openly as a transgender person. Never. A 2006 report from the Transgender Law Center of 194 trans people found a 35% unemployment rate in San Francisco, at a time when the official rate for the area was at 4.7%. Over 60% made less than $15 000.
