The job training charade

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Title:

The job training charade

Author:

Lafer, Gordon.

ISBN:

9780801439643

9780801489518

Personal Author:

Lafer, Gordon.

Publication Information:

Ithaca, N.Y. : Cornell University Press, 2002.

Physical Description:

ix, 297 p. ; 24 cm.

Contents:

How many jobs are there? : labor demand and the limits of training policy -- How important is education? : rhetoric and reality in the skills mismatch debate -- Does job training work? : lessons from the Job Training Partnership Act -- Power and "empowerment" : the final frontier of job training -- The politics of job training : the legislative history of JTPA -- Job training after welfare reform : training for discipline -- Conclusion : job training as political diversion.

Subject Term:

Occupational training -- Government policy -- United States -- Evaluation.

Formation professionnelle -- Politique gouvernementale -- âEtats-Unis -- âEvaluation.

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Copies:

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Library	Material Type	Item Barcode	Shelf Number	Copy	Status
Searching... 1:IIEMSA	1:GEN-BOOK	33168020379091	331.2592/0973 L162J 2002	1	Searching... Unknown

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Summary

Job training has long been promoted as a central policy response to poverty and unemployment. Both Democrats and Republicans have trumpeted training as the answer to everything from welfare to NAFTA. The Job Training Charade provides a comprehensive critique showing that training has been a near-total failure. Even more dramatically, the book shows how politicians have ignored repeated reports of the program's failure, and have kept funding a policy they know cannot work. Gordon Lafer first examines the economic assumptions and track record of training policy. He goes on to provide a political analysis of why job training has remained so popular despite widespread evidence of its economic failure. The author concludes that job training functions less as an economic prescription aimed at solving poverty than as a political strategy aimed at managing the popular response to economic distress. The Job Training Charade is a landmark book showing how a bipartisan consensus may coalesce behind a phantom policy that serves political needs while ignoring economic realities.