People who are difficult or impossible to employ. Problems over employment may arise from physical, mental, cultural or behavioural characteristics. In all cases this is a matter of degree; physical and mental problems vary in severity, and relatively few people are completely unemployable. Physical disabilities restrict the range of jobs some people can fill: for example, the blind cannot be airline pilots. Mental problems also restrict the range of possible jobs: some work requires high intelligence, but there are many repetitive jobs which less intelligent people do well while clever ones become too bored to perform properly. Language problems limit the jobs open to some minority groups. The most severe difficulty arises with behavioural problems; it is very difficult to employ habitual thieves, violent drunks or those with severe drugs problems. How likely those with employability problems are to have a job depends on the overall state of the labour market. If ordinary workers are in excess supply, employers prefer to avoid the extra costs and trouble involved in employing problem cases. If labour is scarce, employers are willing to adapt jobs to suit the disabled, to provide special training for workers with language difficulties, and to put up with moderate degrees of misconduct, particularly by people who are good at their job.

• standard rate
• standby arrangement
• staple product
• State Earnings-Related Pension Scheme
• state enterprise
• state-owned company
• state, welfare
• statics, comparative
• stationary time series
• statistical discrepancy
• statistics
• statutory monopoly
• steady state
• steady-state growth
• step function
• sterilization
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• sterling
• sterling area
• sterling M3
• sticky prices
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• stochastic
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