A Future of Good Jobs?

Cover

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Title Page, Copyright

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pp. v-vi

Contents

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pp. vii-

Acknowledgments

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pp. ix-

First and foremost, we appreciate the strong support that the Board of Directors of the Upjohn Institute and Randy Eberts, the Institute’s executive director, gave to this project, which was commissioned in honor of the seventyfifth anniversary of the W.E. Upjohn Institute Trustee Corporation. Many individuals made important contributions at various stages of the project, which culminated in a conference in June 2007 in Washington, DC...

1- Introduction and Overview

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pp. 1-16

Can the U.S. economy generate healthy growth of “good” jobs— jobs that will ensure a steady improvement in the standard of living for the middle class and that will offer a way out of poverty for lowincome Americans? This is the fundamental economic policy challenge facing our country in an age of intense global competition. ...

2 - Are Skills the Problem: Reforming the Education and Training System in the United States

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pp. 17-80

The stellar economic growth of the United States since the early 1990s surprised scholars and policy analysts who had decried the mediocre skills of the American workforce and the inadequate preparation of students for careers. Unlike other countries, which have comprehensive school and career development systems, the United States...

3 - Revising Employers’ Role in Sponsoring and Financing Health Insurance and Medical Care

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pp. 81-118

Globalization of markets is the straw that is breaking the camel’s back of employer-financed health insurance in the United States. General Motors’ (GM) CEO Rick Wagoner is perhaps the most visible chief executive to declare that the cost of health care must be reallocated away from employers and toward workers and the government. ...

4 -Trade and Immigration: Implications for the U.S. Labor Market

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pp. 119-160

In the United States, debate and concern about trade and immigration, two of the major components of globalization, have focused to date on low and moderately skilled workers. This focus is changing. As trade in services expands and as attention is directed to American technological leadership and a high-skill workforce, the more highly-skilled...

5 - Removing Barriers to Work for Older Americans

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pp. 161-201

Over the next dozen years, as the baby boomers age, the share of the population aged 55 and older is projected to grow dramatically, from 21.4 percent in 2000 to 25.1 percent by 2010 and 29.5 percent by 2020. Over the same period, the share of the population aged 25–54—the age group that historically has been attached most strongly...

6 - Improving Job Quality: Policies Aimed at the Demand Side of the Low-Wage Labor Market

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pp. 203-244

The last decades have been anxious ones for U.S. employees. The sources of worry are not hard to identify: for most workers, wages have not grown even at the pace of productivity gains, health and pension benefits are harder to obtain, and job security seems increasingly shaky. For many employees, stress levels and work/family pressures...

7 - Boosting the Earnings and Employment of Low-Skilled Workers in the United States: Making Work Pay and Removing Barriers to Employment and Social Mobility

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pp. 245-304

The last few decades of the twentieth century witnessed fairly dramatic changes in the labor market outcomes and socioeconomic status of American workers at the bottom of the earnings distribution. Earnings of the least skilled adults either stagnated or fell. Moreover, labor force participation and employment have declined considerably...

The Authors

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pp. 305-306

Index

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pp. 307-325

About the Institute

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pp. 327-

The W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research is a nonprofit research organization devoted to finding and promoting solutions to employment- related problems at the national, state, and local levels. It is an activity of the W.E. Upjohn Unemployment Trustee Corporation, which was established in 1932 to administer a fund set aside...