ABSTRACT

A related balancing act: extending the length of the training period would improve the odds that completers acquired the basic skills that employers were seeking. One place to begin is to raise the question as to the goal of national employment and training policy, past, present, and future. One answer is to emphasize what the goal is not. From a longer-term perspective, brief attention must be directed to some of the more important structural changes underway in the American society and economy that increase the need for stronger employment and training efforts at all levels and in all sectors—federal, state, and local—private and not-for-profit. In the growing national concern with drug trafficking, insufficient attention has been paid to its corrosive influence in weakening the stability of many inner-city neighborhoods and in providing the wrong signals for young people.