Beautiful minds, wasted: how not to squander the potential of autistic people

Are they even that positive?

There always seems to be this underlying "yeah they are freaks, but you can take advantage of their weird behaviour".

Oh I follow your thought process and definitely feel like agreement is natural. I guess that's kind of what I was itching at - that even starting from a blank sheet of paper, finding good, reliable, mature employees in many respects is difficult. I always hated when a "slacker" employee or a habitual "no show" meant more work for me, and that's probably a pretty natural condition. Thus when the article does mention - albeit somewhat politely - that some accommodations shouldn't be that difficult, I'm incredulous. "Regular" people already come with their own litany of issues, it's just modern life!

I can say that for years and years a local grocery store I frequented had a few employees with Downs Syndrome. They were able to perform some menial tasks like bagging quite well. They arrived as a group, and from what I recall, the system worked as intended.

On the other hand, down the street was a grocery store that hired teenagers - run of the mill 15 and 16 year olds - to be bag people and possibly a cashier. These were the only jobs the teenagers were qualified to do. I'm not intending to take sides here, but it does strike me as an economic puzzle where now there's two groups of people - the handicapped, and the immature youth - both competing for the same low-level job. That's...not good.

Add in a 3rd group - the "must work because Social Security doesn't pay enough" elderly seeming to not leave the workforce, and it's no surprise a consumer-centric economic system like the US grinds to a halt. The natural cycle is, in my view, busted.

I was one of those teenagers who was able to get into the workforce early, and I genuinely believe it has helped my growth both as an employee, but also a citizen. I'm grateful for the opportunities I've had, and it genuinely does pain me to survey the current US workforce situation and lament conditions which I have no real solution to offer.

In short, my answer to your "why" actually rhymes: ROI, that's why.

A gifted, talented, socially well adjusted person has an extensive potential to do amazing things. Thus, it's my perspective that starting with those who have un-actualized talent - those with the capacity, aptitude and attitude to rise high in achievement - is more compelling than spending extensive time and money on maximizing the use of a limited capacity. That's kind of the whole thought behind trying to identify smart and capable people - it's their potential.

Inherited and incurable, that's the most I disclose publicly. I grew up in a pre-HIPAA world and still keep some things as private as possible.

He has a kuato. Let's try to be mature about it.

It's still deeply tacky empty euphemism. Do non-autistic people have ugly minds?

Of what use is a classification system when the elements belonging to the same class have no general, discernible commonalities?

Throwing out your pet quote like that was much like reading a microsoft help manual. Technically correct, but no help at all.

It didn't really address djrobstep's post apart from a trite, "Everyone is different," observation, and certainly didn't address the real pain and grief there can be, caring and loving someone with such serious disabilities.

I think removing the Asperger's from the DSM was in many ways a disservice. It was a useful distinction of high level autistics, which is really the group the article is talking about for the most part, to the more seriously effected like djrobstep's brother.

And to finish with a quote of my own:

“In an ideal world the scientist should find a method to prevent the most severe forms of autism but allow the milder forms to survive. After all, the really social people did not invent the first stone spear. It was probably invented by an Aspie who chipped away at rocks while the other people socialized around the campfire. Without autism traits we might still be living in caves.” -- Temple Grandin

Used it, but somethings just I couldn't find the right spelling for.

Most of the spelling errors in their post were 'wrong word' errors, aka the [Cupertino effect][0]. A spell checker would not have found those. It's possible they were also relying on auto-completion, which increases this type of error.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cupertino_effect

The article notes that Walgreen's (exclusively service jobs) has found their autisitc employees are as productive as normal ones. Do you think that they are not employing people with severe autism?

> It takes a certain kind of child to stay inside and poke at computers all day instead of going outside and doing something social.

a) Why do you assume that working on computers at a young age necessarily implies social impairment? I've been working on different ideas (particularly games and businesses) with friends since I was 12.

b) Many sports also require hyper-focus to excel at a young age. If you're willing to use that as a criterion for autism, why aren't exceptional athletes who spend hours a day shooting hoops alone considered autistic?

So the legislation achieved the desired effect?

The means justify the ends in this case, I think.

> Sadly, they do it for their own benefit.

Around here a consulting company has specialised in this (you don't get an interview unless you have an autism spectrum diagnosis) and last I heard it wasn't at all sad:

Some autistic people with correct skills were paid good money to do things they really liked well like iron out rare bugs in financial services etc.

So not only to fill some quota and not taken advantage of. Oh, and said company made good money IIRC.

Which matters more: that they do something right, or that they do it for the right reasons?

Or: Which matters more to you, that they help people, or that their hearts are pure?

Let me introduce you to the market, where self interested parties exchange goods and services for mutual benefit, increasing society's wealth.

Sounds like federal law is working!

I donate a substantial portion of my salary to charity. My primary reason for doing so is because I derive utility from the feeling of contributing to the collective good of humanity.

Does that make my good acts and charitable contributions somehow less valuable?

Moreover, the entire point of such tax incentives is to offset the additional difficulty and cost of employing challenging employees.

This is the point I was going to make. Lifetime incidence of mood disorders appears to be over 10% as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mood_disorder#Epidemiology.

Since the rate of autism diagnosis has increased, I'd also like to hear more about the predictive accuracy of some of those statistics. When you read that only 50% of autistic children in the US graduate high school, you have to read that in the context of rapidly increasing diagnosis. Does that mean that the kids that are currently being diagnosed still have only a 50% chance of graduating?

Let me rephrase it, are we diagnosing these disorders wrongly or are we heading towards a human population which has more people with disorders then not? Because 1 in 38 or 42 are scary numbers.