Panel: Low-Skilled Workers: Employment Experiences and Attempts at Workforce Integration
(Employment and Training Programs)

Friday, November 7, 2014: 1:30 PM-3:00 PM
Enchantment Ballroom C (Hyatt)

*Names in bold indicate Presenter

Panel Organizers:  William Mabe, Rutgers University
Panel Chairs:  William Mabe, Rutgers University
Discussants:  Kevin Hollenbeck, W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research


Workforce Outcomes of Wia on the Job Training in Ohio
Kristin J. Harlow1, Lisa Neilson2 and Joshua Hawley2, (1)The Ohio State University, (2)Ohio Education Research Center


The Great Recession has diminished the economic prospects of low-skilled adults. In the face of the economy's shift toward higher skilled employment and the continuing dislocations of the Great Recession, how have individuals toward the lower end of the educational distribution, especially high school drop outs and those with only a high school diploma or GED, fared? How successful have programs that have sought to better integrate these individuals into the workforce been? The four papers in this panel study these questions using linked, longitudinal administrative data. Zhang and Stack analyze the labor market experiences of a Maryland County high school drop outs and diagnose the role of school characteristics. They link student-level public high school administrative data with Maryland's Unemployment Insurance (UI) wage record data to study the labor market outcomes of students who dropped out of school in the 12th grade between 2004 and 2008. Cumpton, Christensen, and Smith study the employment outcomes of Texas high school graduates from the 2008 – 2009 academic year who do did not enroll in postsecondary education and compares them to their peers who entered postsecondary education. They merge Texas high school unit record data with UI wage record data and higher education data to construct post-high school employment and education pathways for high school graduates. Powell and Mabe study the labor market outcomes of individuals who participated in occupational skills training in New Jersey between 2006 and 2010. The paper combines Employment Services data with UI wage and UI claims data to compare UI recipients who complete occupational skills training with UI recipients who enroll in but do not complete training, and uses matching methods to maximize the similarity of the treatment and comparison groups in terms of observable characteristics. Hawley and Neilson use linked UI wage record and Quarterly Census of Employment and Earnings (QCEW) data from Ohio to follow participants in OJT between 2006 and 2008 from their participation in the program to their employment after the OJT subsidy ended. Using linked, firm-level and employee-level data allows them to assess the extent to which the firms that receive OJT contracts hire OJT participants, to examine the effect of the OJT program on participants' labor market outcomes, and to track their labor market experiences over time. Overall, these four papers address a crucial problem facing policy makers in the wake of the Great Recession; namely, how to ensure that the young and the low-skilled are not pushed to the margins of the labor market. Using linked, longitudinal administrative data allows the researchers to investigate the long-term employment outcomes of these individuals over a number of years. These unique analyses produce a number of policy implications to help policy-makers integrate low-skilled workers into the post-recession economy.
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