The Obama budget for next fiscal year adds $11.6 billion—most of the Labor Department’s spending request– for job training programs. This is in spite of a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report that Federal job training programs are rife with waste and fraud.
The Keynesian spending route pursued by the Obama Administration, in hopes of bolstering the economy and creating jobs, has failed while running up a federal debt of more than $14 trillion. Some 1.4 million people have been out of work for 99 weeks or longer, as noted in a Congressional Research Service (CRS) report. With loss of skills, job training and retraining are essential for rehiring and economic growth.
The newly released Government Accountability Office (GAO) report exposes a “broken web” of federal job training and unemployment programs. Some 47 separate employment and training programs were run by nine different federal agencies at a cost of about $18 billion.
Only five of these 47 programs have had an assessment study completed since 2004 to see what, if any outcomes resulted from the programs rather than from another cause. Half of the programs have not had a performance review since 2004. The GAO found that “little is known about the effectiveness of most programs.”
Nearly all federal training programs “overlap with at least one other program.”
For the nearly 14 million Americans out of work and millions more underemployed “no issue weighs more heavily than income security and learning new skills to better compete in a challenging job market,” said the GAO report.
The federal government, however, has taken on a role for which it was never intended. “The authority to operate job training programs is left to the states under Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution. When the federal government oversteps the enumerated powers delegated to it under the Constitution, it is often at the expense of properly conducting its expected role.”
Sufficient incentives exist “in the private sector to train employees to fill their business needs.”
The dozens of federal training programs and billions of dollars spent “have left millions of Americans grasping for the skills they need. But “without demonstrable results, these programs are merely siphoning away resources that could be better spent elsewhere, or not spent at all,” added the report.
One of the few programs which had an impact study conducted since 2004 was the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) Adult and Dislocated Workers program. In December 2008, an evaluation found the benefits for laid-off workers in the WIA to be “small or nonexistent.”
Washington can encourage “an economic environment that attracts and retains investment and productivity” in the U.S. by reducing the national debt, opening foreign markets to U.S. goods and services, cutting regulatory burdens on small businesses and ensuring predictable government policies “so employers can make short-and long-term investment and management decisions.”
The GAO report was sought by Sen. Tom A. Coburn (R-Okla). In a February 2011 open letter to taxpayers, Coburn wrote: “Beyond the duplication” and lack of results a glimpse into some of the training programs reveals “numerous examples of waste, mismanagement and even corruption.” Some seeking job training spent their day riding a bus. High school students were exposed to cancer-causing asbestos as part of their job training. Others were “trained for jobs that didn’t exist,” or were paid to be educated about jobs they already had. A contractor was paid for “ghost employees” and to buy video games. Job training administrators spent extravagantly on “meals and bonuses for themselves.”
In Obama’s $12.8 billion budgeted for the Labor Department in 2012, $11.6 billion is for training programs. Only $60 million is for training for “green” industries. An expected 10,000 people will be so trained, according to the Labor Department’s budget document.
Apparently aware of the necessity for evaluations of the array of training programs—to give the devil his due–the 2012 budget asks for $11 million for evaluations. But it is said they will take the next five to seven years.
Here are summary examples of failed training programs listed by Sen. Coburn:
Instead of helping others train for jobs with $32 million in federal and state funds, the Tampa Bay Workforce Alliance used the money to serve itself. While unemployment rates soared in Florida, the Alliance spent generously on the taxpayers’ dime. In February 2010 the Florida Inspector General found the Alliance spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on lavish partying, not training for jobs.
New Jersey got $119 million in stimulus money from the Energy Department to train and place workers in jobs to make low-income homes more energy efficient. As of July 2010, only 5 percent of the funding was spent. Only $1 million of the millions set aside for job training has been used to train and certify job seekers. Only seven of 184 workers receiving job training have found work, prompting New Jersey to halt the job training program.
Federal performance measures are inadequate to assess the quality of workforce programs, yet federal laws are inhibiting efforts in Minnesota to improve the efficiency and accountability of its workforce system, Minnesota’s Office of Legislative Auditor finds. Those needing job training and employment assistance aren’t getting proper help because of a complex tangle of federal rules. Workforce programs are not well integrated, despite the intent of the federal Workforce Investment Act [$10 billion is budgeted for 2012] to develop a one-stop delivery system.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), known as the stimulus law, allocated $90 billion for green job technology. Vice President Biden said people who make $20 an hour before a green job training program will make $50 an hour after. Many recent green energy training program graduates are finding that, despite the infusion of stimulus money, the green jobs may just not be there.
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