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A Methodology For Setting State And Local Regression-Adjusted Performance Targets For Workforce Investment Act Programs, Randall W. Eberts, Wei-Jang Huang, Jing Cai Nov 2012

A Methodology For Setting State And Local Regression-Adjusted Performance Targets For Workforce Investment Act Programs, Randall W. Eberts, Wei-Jang Huang, Jing Cai

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

Beginning with PY2009, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA) adopted a regression-adjusted approach for setting national targets for several federal workforce development programs, including WIA Adult, Dislocated Worker, and Youth programs. Prior to that time, national targets were based on past performance and the desire to encourage continuous improvement in the workforce programs. The continuous improvement approach typically increased target levels from year to year without a systematic way of accounting for changes in economic conditions or the ability to meet previous targets. The onset of the 2007–2009 recession drew into question this practice, and the …


Return On Investment In Workforce Development Programs, Kevin M. Hollenbeck Nov 2012

Return On Investment In Workforce Development Programs, Kevin M. Hollenbeck

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

Under more and more fiscal scrutiny because of shrinking state and local budgets, workforce development programs are being asked to estimate their return on investment (ROI). This paper introduces basic concepts of ROI in workforce development programs. It distinguishes ROIs estimated for workforce programs from those that are estimated for financial investments or capital projects. The paper furthermore exposits the basic ingredients of an ROI study—identification of the treatment and time periods of analysis, identification of the net impacts of the program, and identification of net costs. Finally, the paper presents results from the estimation of the ROI for postsecondary …


The Short-Term Effects Of The Kalamazoo Promise Scholarship On Student Outcomes, Timothy J. Bartik, Marta Lachowska Aug 2012

The Short-Term Effects Of The Kalamazoo Promise Scholarship On Student Outcomes, Timothy J. Bartik, Marta Lachowska

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

In order to study whether college scholarships can be an effective tool in raising students’ performance in secondary school, we use one aspect of the Kalamazoo Promise that resembles a quasi-experiment. The surprise announcement of the scholarship created a large change in expected college tuition costs that varied across different groups of students based on past enrollment decisions. This variation is arguably exogenous to unobserved student characteristics. We estimate the effects of this change by a set of “difference-in-differences” regressions where we compare the change in student outcomes in secondary school across time for different student “length of enrollment” groups. …


An Analysis Of The Employment Effects Of The Washington High Technology Business And Occupation (B&O) Tax Credit: Technical Report, Timothy J. Bartik, Kevin M. Hollenbeck Jun 2012

An Analysis Of The Employment Effects Of The Washington High Technology Business And Occupation (B&O) Tax Credit: Technical Report, Timothy J. Bartik, Kevin M. Hollenbeck

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

This paper estimates the effects of an R&D tax credit in the state of Washington on job creation. The research uses micro-data on the job creation and tax credits received by individual firms in the state of Washington from 2004 to 2009. We correct for the endogeneity of R&D tax credits received by individual firms by using instrumental variables based in part on national industry factor shares for R&D. We estimate that this tax credit created jobs, but at a high cost. The cost per job-year created is estimated to be between $40,000 and $50,000. The credit was so high …


Simulating The Effects Of Michigan's Mega Tax Credit Program On Job Creation And Fiscal Benefits, Timothy J. Bartik, George A. Erickcek Jun 2012

Simulating The Effects Of Michigan's Mega Tax Credit Program On Job Creation And Fiscal Benefits, Timothy J. Bartik, George A. Erickcek

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

This paper simulates job and fiscal impacts of Michigan’s MEGA tax credit program for job creation. Under plausible assumptions about how such credits affect business location decisions, the net costs per job created of the MEGA program are simulated to be of modest size. The job creation impacts of MEGA are simulated to be considerably larger than devoting similar dollar resources to general business tax cuts. The simulation methodology developed here is applicable to incentives in other states.


Discrimination And The Effects Of Drug Testing On Black Employment, Abigail Wozniak Jun 2012

Discrimination And The Effects Of Drug Testing On Black Employment, Abigail Wozniak

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

Nearly half of U.S. employers test job applicants and workers for drugs. I use variation in the timing and nature of drug testing regulation to study discrimination against blacks related to perceived drug use. Black employment in the testing sector is suppressed in the absence of testing, consistent with ex ante discrimination on the basis of drug use perceptions. Adoption of pro-testing legislation increases black employment in the testing sector by 7–30 percent and relative wages by 1.4–13.0 percent, with the largest shifts among low skilled black men. Results suggest that employers substitute white women for blacks in the absence …


Mediating Incentive Use: A Time-Series Assessment Of Economic Development Deals In North Carolina, T. William Lester, Nichola Lowe, Allan Freyer Apr 2012

Mediating Incentive Use: A Time-Series Assessment Of Economic Development Deals In North Carolina, T. William Lester, Nichola Lowe, Allan Freyer

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

State incentive granting for the purpose of firm retention or recruitment remains highly controversial and is often portrayed as antithetical to long-range economic development planning. This paper uses quasi-experimental methods to measure the impact of state-level economic development incentives on employment growth at the establishment level in North Carolina. Using North Carolina’s rich history of strategic planning and sector-based economic development as a backdrop, we develop a theory of sectoral “mediation.” This enables us to compare the effectiveness of incentives offered in mediated and nonmediated industries and show that when incentives are coupled with sectoral economic development efforts they generate …


Short Hours, Long Hours: Hour Levels And Trends In The Retail Industry In The United States, Canada, And Mexico, Françoise Carré, Chris Tilly Apr 2012

Short Hours, Long Hours: Hour Levels And Trends In The Retail Industry In The United States, Canada, And Mexico, Françoise Carré, Chris Tilly

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

In settings where most workers have full-time schedules, hourly wages are appropriate primary indicators of job quality and worker outcomes. However, in sectors where full-time schedules do not dominate—primarily service-producing activities—total hours matter, in addition to hourly wages, for job quality and worker outcomes. In this paper we employ a sector-focused, comparative framework to further examine hours levels—measured as average weekly hours—and trends in Canada, the United States, and Mexico. We analyze the retail sector, which is of interest because of its high rate of part-time employment in the U.S. Based on our fieldwork in the United States and Mexico …


Retiree Health Benefits As Deferred Compensation: Evidence From The Health And Retirement Study, James Marton, Stephen A. Woodbury Mar 2012

Retiree Health Benefits As Deferred Compensation: Evidence From The Health And Retirement Study, James Marton, Stephen A. Woodbury

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

Are early retiree health benefits (RHBs) a form of deferred compensation that binds workers to an employer? Most employers who offer RHBs offer them only to workers who have 10 or more years of tenure with the firm and have reached age 55. Accordingly, workers in firms offering RHBs have an incentive to stay with a firm in the years before they attain eligibility for RHBs, and a greater incentive than otherwise to retire thereafter. We test for the existence of such a pattern of incentives by examining the age-specific relationship between workers’ eligibility for RHBs and retirement. The findings …


America's Human Capital Paradox, Thomas A. Kochan Mar 2012

America's Human Capital Paradox, Thomas A. Kochan

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

It is widely recognized that human capital is essential to sustaining a competitive economy at high and rising living standards. Yet acceptance of persistent high unemployment, stagnant wages, and other indicators of declining job quality suggests that policymakers and employers undervalue human capital. This paper traces the root cause of this apparent paradox to the primacy afforded shareholder value over human resource considerations in American firms and the longstanding gridlock over employment policy. I suggest that a new jobs compact will be needed to close the deficit in jobs lost in the recent recession and to achieve sustained real wage …