Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

What Should States Do About Incentives?, Timothy J. Bartik

Presentations

No abstract provided.

Individual Training Accounts And Nonstandard Work Arrangements, Randall W. Eberts

Upjohn Institute Technical Reports

This paper was commissioned by the Organisation for Economic and Co-operative Development (OECD) to describe the use of Individual Training Accounts (ITAs) under the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act and under its predecessor the Workforce Investment Act (WIA). Particular interest is in the use of ITAs by WIOA participants from nonstandard work arrangements. The study provides detailed information about the use of ITAs by participants of the two adult programs under WIOA, Disadvantaged Adult Programs and Dislocated Worker Programs, and in two states, Michigan and Washington. Information for the WIOA programs is gathered and analyzed from the public-use version of …

Should Place-Based Jobs Policies Be Used To Help Distressed Communities?, Timothy J. Bartik

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

Should policymakers seek to increase jobs in particular local labor markets? Yes, but only if these policies are well targeted and designed. Encouraging job growth in distressed places can cause persistent gains in employment-to-population ratios. But our current place-based jobs policies, under which state and local governments provide long-term tax incentives to megacorporations, are poorly targeted and designed. Such incentives are as large in nondistressed areas as in distressed areas, and they are excessively costly. What reforms are needed? First, job growth policies should target distressed areas. Second, tax incentives should be focused on high-multiplier businesses, such as high-tech firms. …

The Occupational Structures Of Low- And High-Wage Service Sector Establishments, Eliza C. Forsythe

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

The occupational structure of an establishment provides a description of its production process by detailing the distribution and relative intensity of tasks performed. In this paper, I investigate whether there are substantive differences in the occupational structures of low- and high-wage service sector establishments. I show that low-wage establishments organize production to use less labor in professional occupations compared to high-wage establishments operating in the same local-labor market and industry. In addition, low-wage establishments employ fewer individuals in information technology occupations, employ fewer managers, and have substantially wider supervisory spans of control. These results indicate that, despite operating in the …

Stem And The Local Economy: Do Regions Reap The Benefits Of A Stem-Educated Workforce?, Fran Stewart

Employment Research Newsletter

No abstract provided.

Do Recessions Accelerate Routine-Biased Technological Change? Evidence From Vacancy Postings, Brad J. Hershbein, Lisa B. Kahn

Employment Research Newsletter

No abstract provided.

Charles Ballard Interview, Justin Carinci

External Papers and Reports

Professor Charles Ballard of Michigan State University delivered the lecture “The Fall and Rise of Income Equality in the United States” Sept. 27, 2017 as part of the Werner Sichel Lecture Series at Western Michigan University. Ballard detailed the “Great Convergence” of income equality in the United States that grew out of policies of the 1930s and 1940s and a “Great Divergence” of inequality starting about 1980. Ballard called this income gap, which is now greater than during the Gilded Age, “the largest economic phenomenon of our lifetimes.”

Veterans In Workforce Development: Participation And Labor Market Outcomes, Colleen Chrisinger

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

This paper compares the employment status and earnings of veterans and nonveterans following their receipt of public workforce development services in Washington State during the years 2002–2012. It also describes workforce program participation patterns for veterans and nonveterans to determine if veterans have equal or prioritized access to key programs, where prioritization is required by law. Based on tabulations and propensity score weighted regressions using administrative data, the results indicate slightly lower levels of participation by veterans than nonveterans in two major workforce programs (Wagner-Peyser and the Workforce Investment Act Adult program), and high participation in veteran-specific programs (Disabled Veterans …

Confronting Policy Challenges Of The Great Recession: Lessons For Macroeconomic Policy, Eskander Alvi Editor

Upjohn Press

This book presents several notable economists who describe the perils the economy faced during the Great Recession and the policies—some successful, others not so much—that were implemented and why. By now, economists have had nearly a decade to examine the causes and consequences of the damage wrought by the Great Recession, and to assess the ensuing efforts to right the economy. The unprecedented losses, which spread across the global economy, posed extraordinary challenges for central bankers and policymakers alike, who were forced to throw out the playbook and create new, untested means for restoring growth.

The Stem Dilemma: Skills That Matter To Regions, Fran Stewart

Upjohn Press

Fran Stewart dives into the murky waters where education and economic goals meet to confront several key issues facing policymakers and educators, including the role of public investment in human capital, the types of human capital investment that provide the greatest public return, and whether those investments should vary by region.

She shows that not all high-paying jobs require STEM skills; that not all good-paying, highly skilled STEM jobs require college degrees; and that "soft skills" are important for STEM as well as other high-paying jobs.

Net Impact And Benefit-Cost Estimates Of The Workforce Development System In Washington State, Kevin M. Hollenbeck, Wei-Jang Huang

Employment Research Newsletter

No abstract provided.

Lessons Learned From Public Workforce Program Experiments, Stephen A. Wandner Editor

Upjohn Press

This book chronicles many of the most important experiments and the key lessons derived from the evaluations of both existing large-scale public workforce programs and the development of new interventions—including low-cost experiments based on behavioral science methods.

Net Impact And Benefit-Cost Estimates Of The Workforce Development System In Washington State, Kevin M. Hollenbeck, Wei-Jang Huang

Upjohn Institute Technical Reports

No abstract provided.

Do Recessions Accelerate Routine-Biased Technological Change? Evidence From Vacancy Postings, Brad J. Hershbein, Lisa B. Kahn

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

We show that skill requirements in job vacancy postings differentially increased in MSAs that were hit hard by the Great Recession, relative to less hard-hit areas, and that these differences across MSAs persist through the end of 2015. The increases are prevalent within occupations, more pronounced in the non-traded sector, driven by both within-firm upskilling and substitution from older to newer firms, accompanied by increases in capital stock, and are evident in realized employment. We argue that this evidence reflects the restructuring of production toward more skilled workers and routine-labor saving technologies, and that the Great Recession accelerated this process.

Refining Workforce Education Supply And Demand Analysis: Final Report, Brad J. Hershbein, Kevin Hollenbeck

Kevin Hollenbeck

No abstract provided.

Use Of Unemployment Insurance And Public Employment Services After Leaving Welfare, Christopher J. O'Leary

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

In this paper I examine the rates at which adults in households recently receiving Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) become jobless, apply for and receive unemployment insurance (UI) benefits, and participate in publicly funded employment services. I also investigate the correlation of UI and employment services receipt with maintenance of self-sufficiency through return to work and independence from TANF. The analysis is based on person-level administrative program records from four of the nine largest states between 1997 and 2003. Evidence suggests that three-quarters of new TANF leavers experience joblessness within three years, and one-quarter of the newly jobless apply …

Use Of Unemployment Insurance And Public Employment Services After Leaving Welfare, Christopher J. O'Leary

Christopher J. O'Leary

In this paper I examine the rates at which adults in households recently receiving Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) become jobless, apply for and receive unemployment insurance (UI) benefits, and participate in publicly funded employment services. I also investigate the correlation of UI and employment services receipt with maintenance of self-sufficiency through return to work and independence from TANF. The analysis is based on person-level administrative program records from four of the nine largest states between 1997 and 2003. Evidence suggests that three-quarters of new TANF leavers experience joblessness within three years, and one-quarter of the newly jobless apply …

Sectoral Initiatives And Opportunity Youth, Kevin M. Hollenbeck

Employment Research Newsletter

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Sectoral Initiatives In Solving The Employment Problems Of Opportunity Youth, Kevin M. Hollenbeck

Upjohn Institute Policy Papers

An estimated 6.7 million individuals in the United States are between the ages of 16 and 24 and are not employed, not in school, and have not earned a postsecondary credential. This paper examines the extent to which sectoral initiatives, which operate on the demand side of the labor market, can play a role in facilitating pathways into productive careers for these individuals, who we refer to in the paper as opportunity youth (OY). It is mainly a review of the literature about the effectiveness of workforce development sectoral initiatives and other programs specifically focused on OY. It first reviews …

Principles Of Labor Market Information, James F. Woods, Christopher J. O'Leary

Christopher J. O'Leary

No abstract provided.

Performance Management Of Employment Programs In Hungary And Poland, Christopher J. O'Leary

Christopher J. O'Leary

No abstract provided.

Cost-Effectiveness Of Targeted Reemployment Bonuses, Christopher J. O'Leary, Paul T. Decker, Stephen A. Wandner

Christopher J. O'Leary

Targeting reemployment bonus offers to unemployment insurance (UI) claimants identified as most likely to exhaust benefits is estimated to reduce benefit payments. We show that targeting bonus offers with profiling models similar to those in state Worker Profiling and Reemployment Services systems can improve cost effectiveness. Since estimated average benefit payments do not steadily decline as the eligibility screen is gradually tightened, we find that narrow targeting is not optimal. The best candidate is a low bonus amount with a long qualification period, targeted to the half of profiled claimants most likely to exhaust their UI benefit entitlement.

Effectiveness Of Reemployment Strategies, Christopher J. O'Leary

Christopher J. O'Leary

No abstract provided.

Evaluating Job Training In Two Chinese Cities, Benu Bidani, Chor-Ching Goh, Niels-Hugo Blunch, Christopher J. O'Leary

Christopher J. O'Leary

Recent years have seen a surge in the evidence on the impacts of active labor market programs for numerous countries. However, little evidence has been presented on the effectiveness of such programs in China. Recent economic reforms, associated massive lay-offs, and accompanying public retraining programs make China fertile ground for rigorous impact evaluations. This study evaluates retraining programs for laid-off workers in the cities of Shenyang and Wuhan using a comparison group design. To our knowledge, this is the first evaluation of its kind in China. The evidence suggests that retraining helped workers find jobs in Wuhan, but had little …

Reconsidering Job Training And The Workforce Investment Act, Christopher J. O'Leary, Robert A. Straits, Stephen A. Wandner

Christopher J. O'Leary

No abstract provided.

State Ui Job Search Rules And Reemployment Services, Christopher J. O'Leary

Christopher J. O'Leary

This article examines whether unemployment insurance (UI) requirements pertaining to job searches and UI mechanisms connecting claimants with reemployment services tend to shorten the duration of those claimants' insured unemployment. Evidence is presented from a 2003 National Association of State Workforce Agencies survey of all State UI programs. Also presented is evidence about the effect of State UI policies and reemployment assistance on the duration of insured unemployment. Although the sizes of the estimated impacts differ, the consistent finding is that both UI work search requirements and UI reemployment services tend to shorten claimants' duration of insured unemployment by speeding …

Personal Reemployment Accounts, Christopher J. O'Leary, Randall W. Eberts

Christopher J. O'Leary

No abstract provided.

Evaluating The Effectiveness Of Active Labor Programs In Poland, Christopher J. O'Leary

Christopher J. O'Leary

No abstract provided.

Evaluating The Effectiveness Of Active Labor Programs In Hungary, Christopher J. O'Leary

Christopher J. O'Leary

No abstract provided.

Profiling For Reemployment Bonus Offers, Christopher J. O'Leary

Christopher J. O'Leary

No abstract provided.