Absence of conflict of interest.
Citation
Highlights
- The study's objective was to examine the impact of America's Promise on employment and earnings outcomes.
- The study used a nonexperimental design to compare the outcomes of individuals who participated in America’s Promise to a matched group of individuals who did not. Using administrative data, the authors conducted statistical models to compare the outcomes between treatment and comparison group participants.
- The study found significant relationships between America’s Promise participation and increased employment and earnings in the two years following program enrollment.
- This study receives a low evidence rating. This means we are not confident that the estimated effects are attributable to America's Promise; other factors are likely to have contributed.
Intervention Examined
America’s Promise
Features of the Intervention
America's Promise is a grant program designed to encourage regional partnerships to develop a pipeline of trained workers in the pursuit of addressing labor market needs. Each grantee of America's Promise focuses on one or more eligible industries such as advanced manufacturing, information technology (IT), and health care. Grantees are typically community colleges, local workforce development agencies, nonprofit organizations, and four-year colleges or universities. Grantees are required to provide one or more of the following services: short-term or accelerated training, longer-term intensive training, or upskilling currently employed participants. Within this requirement, programs are able to fund various work-based and classroom learning activities such as registered apprenticeships, paid internships, and competency-based programs. Additionally, programs provide services such as case management, job placement support, and supportive services funding.
Features of the Study
The study used a matched comparison group design to examine the impact of America's Promise on employment and earnings. The treatment group consisted of 3,746 participants who were eligible to receive services from the twelve selected America's Promise grantees that participated in the study. The comparison group consisted of 103,679 participants and was formed from a subset of Wagner-Peyser participants. Comparison group participants were chosen based on similar characteristics to the treatment group and access to similar employment services. The study sample was primarily female (61%), and half were between the ages of 20 and 34 (50%). The largest proportions of the sample were White, non-Hispanic (44%) and Black, non-Hispanic (32%), and over half had a high school diploma/GED or less at enrollment (55%). Data sources included the Workforce Integrated Performance System that provided information on participant characteristics and education and training data, and the National Directory of New Hires that provided employment and earnings data. The authors used statistical models to compare the outcomes of treatment and comparison group members.
Findings
Employment
The study found a significant, positive relationship between America's Promise participation and employment in the first and second year following enrollment.
Earnings and wages
The study found a significant, positive relationship between America's Promise participation and earnings in the second year following enrollment.
Considerations for Interpreting the Findings
Although the authors accounted for baseline age, gender, race and ethnicity, and education level, studies must also control for pre-intervention employment and earnings measured more than one year before program participation. The authors only accounted for earnings and employment in the 9 months prior to program enrollment. Therefore, the study is not eligible for a moderate causal evidence rating, the highest rating available for nonexperimental designs.
Causal Evidence Rating
The quality of causal evidence presented in this report is low because the authors did not ensure that the groups being compared were similar before the intervention. This means we are not confident that the estimated effects are attributable to America's Promise; other factors are likely to have contributed.