Can people with learning disabilities get a good paying job?

[SouthMan28]

As I have a mild learning disability and people say I'm only good enough to work in McDonald's! For which upsets me!

Is there any chance people like me can get a good job and career in life as I'm only 29!

As I feel like l'm stuck in low skilled jobs all my life!

Have you known people with mild learning disabilities to have good jobs and careers?

What are you good at? It might be a case of finding your niche.

What kind of job would you like to do?

You definitely need to start with where your interests and skills are and build on that.
What do you find difficult but could overcome and what tasks would be an absolute no for you?
Are you good with people/tech/animals/admin etc

There might be career groups or advisors who specialize in working with people with learning difficulties and disabilities.

What are your strengths? For instance, I have the maths level of a 6 year old but am good at written English and I’m organised so have worked in areas where those are the skills that are most important. My nephew has autism and is really good at maths and design. He works in engineering. My friends oldest boy has dyslexia and is a blacksmith. Can you think of jobs or self employment that play to what you like doing and feel most suit you?

It's going to depend on your learning disability.
Dyslexia for example may well mean certain things are harder for you, but with a bit of extra work and support is not going to hold you back.

A child, well adult now, in ds special school with quite significant learning disabilities now owns his own gardening business. He’s had a lot of support to get to that and I think his mum and dad help out, ds school often boast about it and rightly so. It’s such an amazing achievement!

What do you like to do? Go down the path with what you enjoy.

I'm good at driving and I'm also good at arranging deliveries to each address. I do also have good basic IT skills.

Could you upskill you ICT to get recognised qualifications? Would you like to work in admin which is largely ICT based?

So you could do deliveries, either driving or arranging them, or perhaps develop your IT skills depending on what you mean by basic. Not sure the pay is necessarily "good" though.

Apply to be a taxi driver with a local company?

There’s no such thing as ‘only MacDonalds’. They’re actually a pretty good organisation to work for, you can progress with them, and for a lower skilled job, the pay is excellent.

There’s lots of people in ‘high-paying jobs’ who are utterly miserable and burnt out. Find what you enjoy - There’s a lot of years left for you to work!

Good luck op x

How about something like transportation or warehouse logistics? Would that be an option? The warehouses I have worked with have teams dedicated to essentially arranging deliveries into & out of the warehouse.

You need to focus on the things you're good at. Many larger companies recognise the value in a more diverse work force. Many now have active programs to employ people with learning difficulties and other conditions . Maybe contact some of the support organisations related to your condition and see if they can assist you in getting some employment opportunities.

McDs has a pretty good career path, so I wouldnt write that off. How do you feel about customer service and working with the public?

if you like driving, what about looking at getting HGV license or passenger transport? Driving instructors can name their price round here at the moment.

If you can get training/ test then HGV drivers are well paid. Or maybe a bus driver.

I have a friend with Downs who is an excellent gardener. Skills driving and basic IT are great if you want to be self employed in a small business and a gardening business is a good job if you like gardening. Maybe think of things along those lines?

What sort of pay are you thinking of OP?
I can think of lots of jobs where you would earn above minimum wage, but if you are thinking of £50,000 + I guess it would be more specialised.

I would like to do a Professional job. Something that pays a good yearly salary. But, unfortunately I'm not very good academically, so I went as high in education to level 2 diploma in construction.

I'd hate to work low paid jobs all my life! And I'm only 29!

can you specialise your driving - learn to drive vehicles that take alot of skill and pay well. crane drivers get a massive wage!

What do you think of as a professional job? Or do you just mean employed? If so where ie. office, outside, in people's homes, hospitality? Do you have level 2 English and Maths qualifications?

What's the learning disability - the description covers such a lot of things.

Something that needs a lot of routine or organisation if that's one of your strong points, transport planning, warehouse management, something like that?

The jobs I couldn't possibly do, would be working with people as I'm not very confident around strangers and I sometimes get people staring or sniggering at me, for which I don't know why they do?!

So that's made me feel very nervous around strangers as I don't want to be judged!

Driving sounds like a good option for you. Would you consider learning to be a train driver? They earn well.
Logistics could work with your skills too.

“Mild learning disability” is a very broad term. Dyslexia is a learning disability as I’m sure we are all aware of high flyers with dyslexia.

are you crafty?
can you make things?