Economic theory presupposes that the Entities of the Social and Solidarity Economy (SSE) should exhibit a greater sensitivity in the labour insertion of groups in danger of social exclusion than should the Capitalist Companies (CC). Therefore, it is expected that the SSE will employ a greater number of people with socio-labour characteristics among its workers against whom the ordinary labour market discriminates negatively. In this context, the objective of this research is focused on the analysis of socio-labour characteristics, salary differences and the degree of inequality in the distribution of salary income of the group of workers with disabilities in the SSE compared to CCs in Spain during the Great Recession (2007–2013) and the beginning of the current economic recovery (2013–2016). Using the data from the Continuous Sample of Working Histories (MCVL, in Spanish), our results show a greater sensitivity from the SSE compared to the CC in labour inclusion of workers with disabilities as well as for most socio-labour characteristics against which the ordinary labour market discriminates negatively. A second conclusion of the results is that the SSE provides a more equitable distribution of salary income for workers with disabilities than the CC, although the wages are comparatively lower.

Background: In recent years, the disabled wage gap between persons with disabilities (PwD) and those without disabilities (PwoD) has widened considerably. However, one of the prime reasons for creating social enterprise is that they include in their goals employ and include vulnerable groups, but such firms are in favor of PwD in relation to wage or not? The main aim of this article is to analyze whether wage discrimination exists between PwD employed by social enterprises (SE) and those employed by capitalist enterprises (CE).Methods: We used microdata from the Continuous Sample of Work Lives (CSWL) for Spain. In terms of the various statistical and econometric methods employed in the study, we used Pearson’s c2 test, and quantile regression and Oaxaca-Blinder wage decomposition.Results: Although wages for persons with disabilities are lower in social enterprises than in capitalist enterprises, this does not occur in every income distribution percentile. If we also consider employees with similar socio-occupational profiles, SE employees earn more than CE employees. However, the same wage gap exists in PwD employment as it does do in the Spanish labor market in terms of gender, age, level of education, skill level, type of contract, working hours, company size, and sector of activity, both in social and capitalist enterprises.Conclusion: Results of the study showed that not only, therefore, are SE more sensitive in terms of the labor inclusion of disabled people but they also pursue more positive PwD wage discrimination than CE.