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Showing results 1 to 9 of approximately 9.
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Why Human Capital Matters Why Human Capital Matters
An economist at the St. Louis Fed discusses the growing importance of human capital in determining a nation’s income.
Discussion Paper
What Works at Scale? A Framework to Scale Up Workforce Development Programs
Workforce development policymakers have access to a growing catalog of training programs evaluated with rigorous randomized controlled trials. This evidence base identifies programs that work in specific geographic and temporal contexts but may not necessarily work in other contexts or at a scale sufficient to meet regional workforce needs. The author examines a sample of recent randomized controlled trials of workforce development programs and reports to what extent this body of evidence informs policymakers about what works at scale. The author finds that most programs are implemented at a ...
Working Paper
Downskilling: changes in employer skill requirements over the business cycle
Using a novel database of 82.5 million online job postings, we show that employer skill requirements fell as the labor market improved from 2010 to 2014. We find that a 1 percentage point reduction in the local unemployment rate is associated with a roughly 0.27 percentage point reduction in the fraction of jobs requiring at least a bachelor?s degree and a roughly 0.23 percentage point reduction in the fraction requiring five or more years of experience. This pattern is established using multiple measures of labor availability, is bolstered by similar trends along heretofore unmeasured ...
Journal Article
Help Wanted: Employers are having a hard time hiring. Not enough workers or not the right skills?
Cover story article on: Help Wanted: Employers are having a hard time hiring. Not enough workers or not the right skills?
Discussion Paper
Benefits Cliffs and the Financial Incentives for Career Advancement: A Case Study of the Health Care Services Career Pathway
Benefits cliffs, which occur when earnings gains are offset by the loss of public benefits, have long been recognized to create financial disincentives for low-income individuals to earn more income. In this paper, the authors develop a new methodology to study benefits cliffs in the context of career advancement. The authors illustrate the change in net financial resources for an individual pursuing the health care services career pathway from certified nursing assistant (CNA) to licensed practical nurse (LPN) to registered nurse (RN). Accounting for increases in taxes and the loss of public ...
Speech
What kind of jobs have been created during the recovery?
Remarks at the Regional Economic Press Briefing, New York City.
Report
Workforce skills across the urban-rural hierarchy
This paper examines differences in the skill content of work throughout the United States, ranging from densely populated city centers to isolated and sparsely populated rural areas. To do so, we classify detailed geographic areas into categories along the entire urban-rural hierarchy. An occupation-based cluster analysis is then used to measure the types of skills available in the regional workforce, which allows for a broader measure of human capital than is captured by conventional measures. We find that the occupation clusters most prevalent in urban areas?scientists, engineers, and ...
Discussion Paper
Restructuring the Eligibility Policies of the Child Care and Development Fund to Address Benefit Cliffs and Affordability: Florida as a Case Study
This paper explores how the current eligibility policies of the federal Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) create benefits cliffs that act as barriers to economic self-sufficiency. By examining Florida data and policies, the authors demonstrate how the program’s existing co-payment schedule affects the same hypothetical family living in two contrasting Florida counties: one with state median living costs and one with high living costs. The authors find that the CCDF income eligibility exit threshold is too low, particularly in high-cost counties. That occurs because the exit threshold ...
Working Paper
No Longer Qualified? Changes in the Supply and Demand for Skills within Occupations
Using a novel database of 159 million online job postings, we examine changes in employer skill requirements for education and specific skillsets between 2007 and 2017. We find that upskilling—in terms of increasing demands for bachelor’s degrees as well as software skills—was a persistent trend among high-skill occupations, but either a temporary or non-existent phenomenon among middle-skill and low-skill occupations. We also find evidence that persistentupskilling in the high-skill sector contributed to greater occupational mismatch that remained elevated during the recovery from the ...