ESRI finds 50% of job schemes have no effect

Seven out of 14 education and training programmes had no discernible effect on the subsequent employability of participants, according to a new report by the Economic & Social Research Institute.

The findings were based on a study of the impact on the labour market of EU supported investments of more than £3 billion (€3.8 billion) between 1994 and 1999.

Of the five top programmes three have since been abolished and the numbers involved in the other two have declined in recent years.

The ESRI found that employment schemes with strong market linkages were most successful in promoting sustained employment in good times as well as bad.

Expenditure on human resources development accounted for about one third of EU aid to the Republic under Community Support Framework between 1994 and 1999.

The survey looked at 14 different education and training programmes. Five were found to enhance the employment prospects of their participants while two had "marginally positive effects". The remaining seven were found to display "no discernible effects on subsequent employment".

The effective schemes included: three employment subsidy schemes; the employment incentive scheme; the employment subsidy scheme; and the enterprise allowance scheme; and two training programmes - specific skills training and job training. The two schemes with only marginally positive effects were the return-to-work and skills-foundation schemes.

By 1998, the three effective employment-subsidy schemes had been abolished. This coincided with the expansion of the back-to-work allowance schemes "which are also characterised by strong market linkages and have proved successful in promoting transitions from unemployment to work, but may be less successful in promoting sustained employment due to high drop-out rates".

"The number of participants in both of the effective training programmes also declined between 1994 and 1998. Over the same period community employment expanded from a throughput of 32,700 in 1994 to more than 54,000 in 1998."

However, the study showed that a direct employment programme with weak linkages to the market was less effective in improving participants' employment prospects.

The report stresses the importance of programmes with strong market linkages, the reduction of the numbers in community employment, and increased involvement in specific skills programmes by the long-term unemployed.

Investing in People: The Labour Market Impact of Human Resource Interventions Funded under the 1994-1999 Community Support Framework in Ireland, is available from the ESRI. The study was conducted by Mr Kevin Denny, Mr Colm Harmon and Dr Philip J O'Connell.