Return to EPI Newsroom | Browse news by TOPIC | Browse archived news by DATE | Search archived news releases by KEYWORD

NewsFlash: November 30, 2006

Money dwindles for job training

Federal funding for an important program essential to America’s competitiveness has fallen from $63 per worker in 1986 to only $35 per worker in 2006, according to today’s Snapshot  by EPI policy director Ross Eisenbrey.  The U.S. Department of Labor, the primary source of federal money for job training, cut training and employment assistance expenditures by nearly a billion dollars, after adjusting for inflation, since 1986.  The DOL increasingly relies on rapid re-employment programs to get workers into jobs without regard to the skill level or quality of the job.

“The government has failed to put its money where its mouth is,” said Eisenbrey.  “Perhaps a new Congress will change this policy and show more willingness to invest in the education and skills of working Americans.”