Assisting Displaced Workers: Do the States Have a Better Idea?

This work provides a comprehensive assessment of state initiatives designed to deal with worker displacement. Leigh considers quantitative and qualitative studies of state programs, evaluations of state- and federally-funded demonstration projects and pilot programs, and studies of the design and operation of foreign government programs.https://research.upjohn.org/up_press/1104/thumbnail.jp

Assisting Workers Displaced by Structural Change: An International Perspective

Leigh begins by providing a summary of the evolution of labor market programs in seven industrialized countries: Australia, Canada, Germany, Japan, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the U.S. He points out that a number of these nations are dealing with long-term unemployment by linking unemployment insurance benefits to participation in labor market programs, and that this is a requirement U.S. policy makers should examine closely. Leigh also performs informal cross-country evaluations of these countries\u27 programs,focusing on policies he feels merit attention. A three-level active labor market program is then proposed for the U.S.https://research.upjohn.org/up_press/1074/thumbnail.jp

Does Training Work for Displaced Workers?: A Survey of Existing Evidence

Leigh examines nine demonstration projects and operating programs to determine how well public retraining programs for displaced workers fulfill their roles.https://research.upjohn.org/up_press/1095/thumbnail.jp

Retraining displaced workers : what can developing countries learn from OECD nations?

The governments of most industrial countries provide financial support for adult training programs intended to retrain displaced workers. The author draws lessons from the experience of six industrial countries (Australia, Britain, Canada, Japan, Sweden, and the United States) on how to design and implement such retraining programs in low-income developing nations and middle-income countries. By retraining, the author means both improving job skills and remediating deficiencies in basic education. These are the lessons he emphasizes: Training programs should be independent of the educational system, with its rigid ties to degree requirements and academic schedules; links to employers must be developed and maintained so that trainees have marketable skills on completing the program. Training programs should be designed to minimize trainees'foregone earnings; basic education should be relevant to the jobs the trainees might seek. External providers of education must be made accountable - but with care; the system of accountability should also ensure that the needs of displaced workers most likely to suffer long-term unemployment are met. Not all displaced workers require relatively expansive retraining; some may need only inexpensive job-search assistance services. A permanent, institutionalized training system is preferable to short-term intervention.Labor Standards,Tertiary Education,ICT Policy and Strategies,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Teaching and Learning

Do Community Colleges Respond to Local Needs?: Evidence from California

Leigh and Gill focus on two major, policy relevant sources of change at the local level. First, on the supply side, they examine how responsive community colleges’ are at meeting the needs of the growing immigrant population for education and training. Then, on the demand side, they look into whether the need of local employers for skilled workers is being met, an issue impacted by dynamic technological change and increased global competition.https://research.upjohn.org/up_press/1032/thumbnail.jp

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Dengue contingency planning: from research to policy and practice

Background Dengue is an increasingly incident disease across many parts of the world. In response, an evidence-based handbook to translate research into policy and practice was developed. This handbook facilitates contingency planning as well as the development and use of early warning and response systems for dengue fever epidemics, by identifying decision-making processes that contribute to the success or failure of dengue surveillance, as well as triggers that initiate effective responses to incipient outbreaks. Methodology/Principal findings Available evidence was evaluated using a step-wise process that included systematic literature reviews, policymaker and stakeholder interviews, a study to assess dengue contingency planning and outbreak management in 10 countries, and a retrospective logistic regression analysis to identify alarm signals for an outbreak warning system using datasets from five dengue endemic countries. Best practices for managing a dengue outbreak are provided for key elements of a dengue contingency plan including timely contingency planning, the importance of a detailed, context-specific dengue contingency plan that clearly distinguishes between routine and outbreak interventions, surveillance systems for outbreak preparedness, outbreak definitions, alert algorithms, managerial capacity, vector control capacity, and clinical management of large caseloads. Additionally, a computer-assisted early warning system, which enables countries to identify and respond to context-specific variables that predict forthcoming dengue outbreaks, has been developed. Conclusions/Significance Most countries do not have comprehensive, detailed contingency plans for dengue outbreaks. Countries tend to rely on intensified vector control as their outbreak response, with minimal focus on integrated management of clinical care, epidemiological, laboratory and vector surveillance, and risk communication. The Technical Handbook for Surveillance, Dengue Outbreak Prediction/ Detection and Outbreak Response seeks to provide countries with evidence-based best practices to justify the declaration of an outbreak and the mobilization of the resources required to implement an effective dengue contingency plan

Introduction [to Assisting Workers Displaced by Structural Change]

Leigh begins by providing a summary of the evolution of labor market programs in seven industrialized countries: Australia, Canada, Germany, Japan, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the U.S. He points out that a number of these nations are dealing with long-term unemployment by linking unemployment insurance benefits to participation in labor market programs, and that this is a requirement U.S. policy makers should examine closely. Leigh also performs informal cross-country evaluations of these countries\u27 programs,focusing on policies he feels merit attention. A three-level active labor market program is then proposed for the U.S.https://research.upjohn.org/up_press/1074/thumbnail.jp