Four factors influence the successful employment of mildly intellectually handicapped young people. These are the qualities of the individual seeking work, employer attitudes, the nature and content of the job, and prevailing labor market conditions. Economic, technological, and labor market trends seem to indicate the development of a dual economy in the future. A highly capital-intensive, high technology, efficient, formal institutional economy will develop that will produce mass goods and services and feature an employed work force of high and rising average skill but small and declining size. The intellectually handicapped will increasingly turn to another developing economy characterized as informal, domestic, self-service (a so-called free economy), devoted to the production of untraded (or informally traded) goods and services involving high labor intensity and alternative technology, with a low-income, low skilled, non-employed work force. Specific suggestions to improve the prospects of the mildly intellectually handicapped for making the transition from childhood to maturity, independence, and employment include incentives for employers; identification of suitable jobs; job restructuring; sheltered work; promotion of sheltered work stations; identification of appropriate educational objectives, vocational skills, and para-vocational skills; career education and work experience; placement, transition, and followup; and legislative action. (YLB)