Upskilling: Do Employers Demand Greater Skill When Skilled Workers Are Plentiful?

Modestino, Alicia Sasser; Shoag, Daniel; Ballance, Joshua

doi:10.2139/ssrn.2788601

Cited by 13 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 24 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Indeed, postsecondary credentials—whether it be a certificate, an associate's degree, or a bachelor's degree—have become a requirement for many jobs that previously required only a high school degree (Modestino, Shoag, & Ballance, ). At the same time, employer expectations for work readiness, communication, and other soft skills have risen—qualifications that are difficult for youth to demonstrate without a track record of work experience (Harrington et al., ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How Do Summer Youth Employment Programs Improve Criminal Justice Outcomes, and for Whom?

Modestino¹

2019

J Policy Anal Manage

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Cities across the U.S. have turned to summer youth employment programs (SYEPs) to improve the behavioral, economic, and academic outcomes of inner‐city youth. This paper evaluates the impact of the Boston Summer Youth Employment Program using both experimental and non‐experimental variation. Similar to previous studies of summer jobs programs in other cities, I make use of an embedded randomized controlled trial and find that the program reduces violent crime by 35 percent, as measured by the number of arraignments from administrative records during the 17 months after participation. In contrast to prior work, I also find a similar reduction in arraignments for property crimes (−29 percent). This study also provides exploratory evidence on the mechanisms driving these reductions in crime using self‐reported responses of participants from a pre‐/post‐program survey. The results provide suggestive evidence that the beneficial impacts on violent and property crime are largely driven by improved conflict resolution skills versus other factors that would increase the opportunity cost of crime. These findings give researchers some insights into the behavioral changes that occur during the program while also providing a look inside the “black box” as to how SYEPs affect youth outcomes in the long run.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

How Do Summer Youth Employment Programs Improve Criminal Justice Outcomes, and for Whom?

Modestino¹

2019

J Policy Anal Manage

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…2 This massive increase in required skills raised concerns that the U.S. labor market faced a structural and persistent mismatch between workers' skills and firms' needs. Here and in Modestino, Shoag, and Ballance (2014), we argue that a significant portion of this increase in employer skill requirements reflects strategic or opportunistic 3 upskilling, whereby firms used slack labor markets as an opportunity to hire more skilled workers, potentially increasing productivity. Rather than mismatch causing unemployment, we claim that a significant portion of the observed changes in skill requirements during the Great Recession resulted from employers' response to loose labor markets.…”

mentioning

confidence: 83%

“…Previous work examining this dynamic found that employers raised education and experience requirements within occupations, and even within firm and job titles (Modestino, Shoag, andBallance 2014, Hershbein andKahn 2016). This growth in skill levels within occupations has colloquially become known as upskilling.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Downskilling: Changes in Employer Skill Requirements Over the Business Cycle

2016

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. 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 dimensions of skill, and even occurs within firm-job title pairs. We further confirm the causal effect of labor market tightening on skill requirements using a natural experiment based on the fracking boom in the United States as an exogenous shock to the local labor supply in tradable, non-fracking industries. These industries are not plausibly affected by local demand shocks or natural gas extraction technology, but still show fewer skill requirements in response to tighter labor markets. Our results imply this labor market-induced downskilling reversed much of the cyclical increase in education and experience requirements that occurred during the Great Recession. Terms of use: Documents inJEL classifications: D22, E24, J23, J24, J63.

show abstract

“…Although there is significant enthusiasm for apprenticeship models in the U.S. resulting in rapid growth, this modern incarnation of apprenticeship design is relatively new, and there is not much evidence that they are actually beneficial in the U.S. economic system [21]. An abundance of research exists from countries such as Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and Australia [18,[22][23][24]. For example, Hanushek, Schwert, Woessmann, and Zhang [25] conducted a large, quasi-experimental study of the long-term effects of vocational education in 11 European countries.…”

Section: Research-based Evidence About Apprenticeshipsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Research suggests that participation in CTE can improve students' employment outcomes [23,30]. Furthermore, studies found that associate's degrees and other post-secondary certificates are linked to increased lifetime earnings and career growth [22,30].…”

Section: Drawbacks Of Apprenticeship-the Case For Higher Ed Alignmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Student Perceptions of Higher Education and Apprenticeship Alignment

Decker¹

2019

Education Sciences

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Since its inception in medieval Europe, apprenticeships have played a vital role in knowledge transfer from one generation to the next. In a mutually beneficial relationship, the master craftsman passes along years of skill and wisdom to the younger apprentice while gaining the youthful, energetic infusion of labor from the burgeoning new learner. In the 21st century, the concept remains largely unchanged, but after years of falling by the wayside, the United States is experiencing a renaissance in the apprenticeship movement. For generations, apprenticeships were marginalized in favor of a more traditional form of classroom-based education now termed Career and Technical Education. However, with economic changes activated by a national ‘skills gap’ and a retiring Baby Boomer generation, the country faces a potential crisis if a skilled workforce is not trained quickly. With just over 500,000 participants nationally, apprenticeship pales in comparison to the 17 million students currently enrolled in higher education. Some of the fastest growing sectors of the American economy such as Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM), and healthcare, have only a few thousand apprentices each. The solution to this challenge lies with the alignment of both methodologies. This article explores the subject of integrating apprenticeship growth and the higher education sector.

show abstract

Upskilling: Do Employers Demand Greater Skill When Skilled Workers Are Plentiful?

Cited by 13 publications

References 24 publications

How Do Summer Youth Employment Programs Improve Criminal Justice Outcomes, and for Whom?

How Do Summer Youth Employment Programs Improve Criminal Justice Outcomes, and for Whom?

Downskilling: Changes in Employer Skill Requirements Over the Business Cycle

Student Perceptions of Higher Education and Apprenticeship Alignment

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About