Ross Eisenbrey of the Economic Policy Institute says if personal re-employment accounts are to work, the government has to be realistic about the cost. He says $3,000 simply isn’t enough to retrain most laid-off workers.

“If people are unemployed because their skills are outmoded and they’re not going to find the kind of skills they’ve done in the past, then they need new skills,” Eisenbrey says. “That can’t be done on the cheap.”