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Discussion Paper
COVID-19, Workers, and Policy
As coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) spreads around the world and across the United States, many policymakers and public health officials are encouraging employers to tell workers to work remotely or to stay home when they or their family members are sick. There are significant questions, though, about how many people can work from home. Many U.S. workers in retail, restaurants, manufacturing, and other occupations cannot do so. This Workforce Currents post will explore who can work from home and identify practices and policies to support workers who cannot work from home in the event of a pandemic ...
Discussion Paper
Fragmentation in Workforce Development and Efforts to Coordinate Regional Workforce Development Systems: A Case Study of Challenges in Atlanta and Models for Regional Cooperation from across the Country
The importance of human capital in regional economic competitiveness is increasingly apparent. However, structural changes, fragmentation, the instability of funding, and other factors have led to challenges for workforce development providers as well as workforce development systems. This fragmentation has created a less coherent and coordinated workforce development system. Often, metropolitan areas have many programs and policies in place to train workers for jobs that require sub baccalaureate credentials or skills. The lack of coordination in local training systems may limit the ...
Discussion Paper
Policies to Close the Southern Skills Gap
Southern states have a number of economic and demographic characteristics that make them unique from the rest of the country—and increase the need to build skills to advance economic development in the region.
Discussion Paper
Reemploying the Unemployed
From March 14 to 28, roughly 9.9 million people (when seasonally adjusted) filed new claims for unemployment insurance across the country.1 That represents roughly 3 percent of the entire population of the United States actively filing for unemployment insurance in two weeks. In addition, the vast proportion of people who are eligible for unemployment insurance do not make a claim. During “normal” times, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that 74 percent of unemployed workers do not file a claim, primarily because they think they are not eligible for unemployment insurance.
Discussion Paper
Who Has COVID-19 Impacted and What’s Been Done to Help?
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reports the unemployment rate monthly. Generally, it gives an idea of the number of Americans who are out of work and looking for new employment. During times of economic stress, however, this metric may not paint a full picture of those who are out of work.Headline unemployment numbers can be misleading, and the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the accuracy of the picture painted by the headline unemployment numbers. For instance, the October jobs report from the BLS identified 11.1 million unemployed workers, or 6.9 percent unemployment. But this ...
Discussion Paper
Then and Now: Key Trends and Transformations in the 21st Century Labor Market (Part 1 of 3)
The US labor market has experienced significant changes since the turn of the century. Some of the most profound changes were driven by technology, others shaped by business, policy, and shifting social norms. Two enormous economic shocks, the Great Recession of 2007–2009 and the pandemic recession of 2020, also drove changes in the economy and labor market. At the time of this writing, the Federal Reserve has been working to bring down inflation rates that last year reached a 40-year high. These major developments have transformed the nature of work and opportunities for American workers. ...
Discussion Paper
Leading, lagging, and left behind: identifying metropolitan leaders and labor market outcomes
From 1990 to 2010, the United States underwent significant changes in the makeup of the population and its educational attainment. During the period, bachelor's degree or higher attainment proportions rose significantly?7.9 percentage points?from 20.3 percent in 1990 to 28.2 percent in 2010. This growth happened unevenly, though. Of 283 metropolitan areas, only 78 were above the 7.9 percentage point increase, suggesting much more concentrated growth than would be expected if growth were experienced evenly. This paper documents the concentration of growth and examines four labor market ...
Discussion Paper
Fragmentation in workforce development and efforts to coordinate regional workforce development systems
The importance of human capital in regional economic competitiveness is increasingly apparent. However, structural changes, fragmentation, the instability of funding, and other factors have led to challenges for workforce development providers as well as workforce development systems. This fragmentation has created a less coherent and coordinated workforce development system. Often, metropolitan areas have many programs and policies in place to train workers for jobs that require sub-baccalaureate credentials or skills. The lack of coordination in local training systems may limit the ...
Discussion Paper
Director's Welcome
The new Center for Workforce and Economic Opportunity will focus on employment and labor market issues. Director Stuart Andreason discusses the center's objectives in this post.
Working Paper
Will talent attraction and retention improve metropolitan labor markets?
Since the early 1990s, metropolitan entities and local governments have targeted incentives, policies, and investments with the goal of highly educated and skilled workers to locate in their communities. These efforts focus on attracting workers who hold a bachelor?s degree or higher and have had a profound effect on the form and management of metropolitan areas, but there is not clear evidence that growth in bachelor?s or higher degree attainment improves metropolitan labor market outcomes. I use an outcomes-based cluster-discriminant analysis to test whether or not metropolitan areas with ...