The authors agree with Vernon M. Briggs, Jr., that U.S. immigration policy has had unexpected consequences. The 1965 immigration reforms led to unanticipated chain migration from developing countries whereas the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act failed to slow unauthorized immigration. The result is a large foreign-born population with…

For more than 30 years the United States has unsuccessfully struggled to reform its often maligned and massively abused immigration policies. Matters went awry following the passage of the Immigration Act of 1965. There were unexpected consequences. Intended to remove the overtly discriminatory features of the "national origins"…

Everyone has an opinion about technology. Depending on whom you ask, it will either: a) Liberate us from the drudgery of everyday life, rescue us from disease and hardship, and enable the unimagined flourishing of human civilization; or b) Take away our jobs, leave us broke, purposeless, and miserable, and cause civilization as we know it to…

Northeastern University economists Paul E. Harrington and Andrew M. Sum argue that a recent report, "Help Wanted", "radically overstates the size of the college labor market." This overcount, they claim, has nothing to do with the recession. "Even in times of near full employment," Harrington and Sum argue that…

A central organizing framework of the voluminous recent literature studying changes in the returns to skills and the evolution of earnings inequality is what we refer to as the canonical model, which elegantly and powerfully operationalizes the supply and demand for skills by assuming two distinct skill groups that perform two different and…

Discusses some ways to help in training unskilled, marginal workers including explaining job importance, emphasizing critical points, allowing mistakes, keeping training sessions brief, using positive reinforcement, and rewarding progress. (JOW)

This paper finds that the ready availability of illegal-immigrant workers from Mexico in major industries in the Southwest region of the United States is having far-reaching and often unanticipated consequences for patterns of investment, employment, and business competition. It reviews the displacement of U.S. workers by illegal immigrants in…

The "other" flexible work force includes the unemployed and low-wage, part-time, temporary, and seasonal workers who are flexible but not by choice. The new labor market may be limited in terms of demand for high skills but may have great need for unskilled, disposable workers. (SK)

Three articles debate the findings of a study: "Low-Skilled People on the European Labor Market: Towards a Minimum Learning Platform?" (Ottersen, Steedman); "The Concept of a Minimum Learning Platform Educational Contents and Methods for Improving the Low-Skilled" (Schneeberger); and "Achieving a Minimum Learning Platform…

In the South, the concept of exclusive education remained functional well into the 1960's. Only the most capable and the most supported children survived the system. Then the nation's priorities changed, with the result that, for the first time in history, literally everybody goes to school. Compared with other public-serving institutions,…

Historically, the business community has been concerned with educational issues. The United States Chamber of Commerce has had an active educational committee involved in shaping federal education policy since the l960s. Local and state school systems, along with business leaders, parent-teacher associations, advisory boards, and school finance…

Analyzes the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development's Jobs Study, which advocated a two-tier economy: high-skill jobs and low-skill, low-wage jobs to absorb the unemployed. Shows how Canada has adopted some of these strategies under the guise of structural adjustment. Advocates a social policy role for adult educators. (Contains 35…

This article presents a critique of the 'high skills' argument which, in the international literature, presents a high skill strategy as an adjunct and necessary condition for the successful expansion of human resources development (HRD) alongside social market institutions and 'joined up' policy. For a developing country such as South Africa,…

Authors assert that public service employment (PSE) is one form of macroeconomic policy and compare PSE to tax reduction, federal subsidies, and other forms. They propose a design for an ongoing federal employment program and conclude that a PSE program aimed at the structurally unemployed creates more jobs per GNP dollar than other policies. (SK)

Interest in recent years has centered on the purposes, forms, effects, and magnitude of private sector training of employees. Demand for detailed and accurate information on these subjects has arisen within idustry itself, within government agencies, education and research institutions, and organized labor. This monograph is an attempt to supply a…