In this White Paper, the Business Roundtable recommends access to AMERICA 21, a 21st-century approach to lifelong learning for workers, as well as assistance for job dislocation. AMERICA 21 would channel funding from the myriad of existing initiatives into a modernized, streamlined system that leverages and builds on today's best private and…

Argues that matching education to jobs is unrealistic. Offers solutions to mitigate unemployment: forget labor force forecasting, relax minimum wage laws, devocationalize schools, encourage private schools, teach vocational skills in specialized schools or the workplace, and target subsidies to the poor. (SK)

Since high technology industries are expected to play an important role in Ontario's future economic development, the educational system must be particularly attuned to the need for middle-level skills in the labor market. The rapid increase in new labor market entrants with middle-level skills is not keeping pace with demand. Employers have the…

As a part of research designed to determine how labor leaders perceive the current relationship between labor and education and to identify activities that could promote greater collaboration in education and work, an advisory committee composed of labor leaders met to analyze labor's role in planning educational activities. Central issues for the…

The crisis in preparing people for work stems from many factors: generalization versus specialization, student employment with little guidance or relevance to future work, changing skill requirements, and labor shortages in specific occupations. The focus of reform should be a greater match between skills training and employment opportunities. (SK)

The Canadian educational system has tended to reinforce the idea that white-collar jobs are more desirable than blue-collar jobs. A study examined various organizational factors which have implications for industrial training, and indicated that the benefits of industrial training and employment in the skilled trades should be more widely…

Vocational education is a must if the United States wishes to compete with the Europeans and Japanese. It cannot be relegated to secondary status in schools. The federal government must play a major role in seeing to a balanced approach to the economic and social goals of vocational education. (CT)

Training policy should try to match changing demand for skills with a labor supply that is changing qualitatively and quantitatively. Infrastructural reform involves establishing closer links between education, training, and the workplace and redirecting funds to new training priorities. (Author/JOW)

Provides a "deliberately provocative bird's-eye view" of new directions in thinking among economists concerned with education. Looks at the socialization function of schooling, the use of educational attainment as a hiring criterion, the importance of the "incomplete" employment contract, and labor market segmentation theory. Considers…

Conditions in Kenya and Poland concerning the labor market and educational preparation for jobs are discussed, along with public policy. In the decade of the 1980s, both nations reached saturation in the labor market and underwent changes in the demand for university-trained workers. Kenya needed highly trained personnel to replace expatriates…

Sweden has worked in the last decade to strengthen the connection between education and employment, but still needs to make futher improvements. Recent shifts in the country's labor markets led to more youth unemployment, the displacement of less-educated workers by the more highly educated, and greater problems in the transition from school to…

The author examines the ability of high-tech industry to provide jobs for graduates of these programs. He also discusses the historical role of vocational education in national policy and the problems that may result from the attempt to prepare students for specific jobs rather than for careers. (CT)

A comprehensive life-cycle framework is offered for examining demographic changes and the world of work. This document establishes connections among the social and economic issues that relate to demographic change and priorities. The document also identifies the changes taking place in the work force, the problems of poor basic education and work…

In the last decade, unprecedented rates of job growth and improvements in adult education were accompanied by increased numbers of children living below the poverty line and a decline in real income for most families. There are several possible explanations: (1) a kind of job growth that produces disincentives for a significant number of people to…

Technological advances have created changes in working life. Automation displaces more workers than the service industry can absorb. The jobs that are left are often downgraded from the complexity they have formerly enjoyed. As society becomes more and more automated, unemployment becomes structural. How do we prepare young people for the jobs of…