The youth labour market in Britain: the role of intervention (No. 62).

Key takeaways

content: "@deakinYouthLabourMarket1996" -file:@deakinYouthLabourMarket1996

Reading notes

Introduction.
Features of the youth labour market.

• Precise, somewhat legalistic definition of youth labour would be young people included in the group bounded by the Statutory School Living Age of 16 and the attainment of adult legal status at age 18. Some vocational education and training processes can start at school as early as age 14 and some can continue to the end of a full apprenticeship of four years at age 20.
• Further market visions occur between trained young people. There are those who are trained, usually in larger firms, and who then enter the internal youth labour market. ILM that is, they obtain employment in the firms in which they were trained and those who move after training into the occupational labour market. OLM, that is, the youth labour market, which is external to the training firm.
• In this regard, Grona and Ryan, 1991 have shown that the transition of youth from school to employment may cause problems to the existing labour force by offering competition through their acceptance of relatively low rates of pay, which, despite the lower productivity of young workers, may pose a threat to adult jobs
  Chapter four, vocational education and training in historical perspective.
  The early post war. 1945 to 1960.
• It's early as April 1942 the post war training of young workers was being studied at that time. The Ministers of Labour and education attended a joint consultative committee meeting to examine the problems of the technical education and industrial training of young workers after the war. They observed. they observed that in Britain, pre employment vocational training had not been developed to the same extent as in either countries and the system of apprenticeships had not been adjusted to make full use of the increased facilities of technical education (Parker 1957 page 366)
  • The committee issued a progress report in December 1944 on the basis of this report, the Minister of labour set up the ints Committee in January 1945 to investigate the juvenile Employment Service Open. parentheses report of the Committee on the Juvenile Employment Service 1945) The ints committee decided that the main defect of the old pre war system of juvenile employment committees was its voluntary nature. So the committee opted for a compulsory system of vocational guidance for school leavers.
  • The recommendations of the ints report were embodied after the exceptions, which have been noted in the employment and Training Act. 1948 section three of the Act empowered the Minister to provide such training courses for persons, whether employed or not, who are above the upper limit of the compulsory schooling age as he thinks necessary or expedient, provided the contributions shall not exceed half a million pounds in a year. The youth employment service, the renamed juvenile employment service, was reformed by this act But the act had little effect on vocational training and industry and commerce (Perry, 1976 page 51)
• The CARR committee had no doubt that British industry could absorb the foreseen increase in the number of young people in the 1960s cohort, but commented where equally certain that it will fail to do so to its own cost unless it increases substantially its present intake into apprenticeships. Therefore, we urge industry are strongly to lose no time reassessing its need for skilled workers and to maintain labour quality in order to enable us to maintain our place as one of the great manufacturing and trading nations of the world. (car report 1958 page 32 to 36)
  • The car report offered some cognitive advice on training for skill, but basically endorsed the volunteerist system of leaving training in the hands of industry. And it effectively ratified the divisions between industry and government.
    The end of volunteerism.
• Conditions in the labour market were very tight in the 1950s and early 1960s. The national Joint Advisory Council, NJAC of the Ministry of labour, set up a working party on the Manpower situation in 1961.
  • Meanwhile, the government issued a white paper on industrial training (industrial training, government proposals, 1962) a training bill was proposed under which the Minister of labour would be given statutory powers to set up boards later named industrial training boards (ITBS.) which would be responsible for all aspects of training in individual industries. The range of functions which these boards might be expected to undertake were given.
  • One aspect of the contemporary background situation was described in the white paper, a serious weakness in our present arrangements is that the amount and quality of industrial training are left to the uncoordinated decisions of a large number of individual firms. These may lack the necessary economic incentive to invest in training people who once trained may leave them for other jobs, while the benefits of training are shared. by all the cost is born only by those firms which decide to undertake training themselves.
• The Industry Training Act was passed by Parliament in March 1964 central training council CTC was established, whose functions were advisory and consultative only, and industry training boards itbs to manage the levy grant system was set up. The first itb was established in June 1964 two more in July, including the important engineering itb. By 1969 there were twenty seven statutory itbs (Perry 1976 page 100 75)
  • Currently, the government training centres gtc's much used during the Secondary World War and somewhat reduced since were expanded to provide more government support, training places. They were used, among other purposes, for first year apprenticeship training for the engineering and construction industries.
    • The expansion of training at GTC was substantial in the 1960s. Trainees were paid a tax free allowance by the government in 1970. These were between eight pounds, five and 14 pounds, 10 per week. according to family circumstances, of course. is provided training in basic skills in 50 different trades. Approximately 90% of trainees who completed their courses were placed in jobs in the trade for which they have been trained on parentheses orchard 1970 at)
    • By March 1969 twenty six of the twenty seven statutory ITBS were in operation and 15 million employees were within the scope of the boards.
  • Even as early as the late 1960s criticisms of the system began to build up. In summary, these were as follows.
    • There was no central direction. The central Training Council, ctc was only advisory and consultative. It had no power to direct the Itbs.
    • Small firms got very little for their levy. And the time they spent dealing with The Associated Paperwork.
    • Large firms continued their apprentice based training practise, much as before the 1964 act.
    • There were problems of defining industry boundaries, and not all workers came within the scope of the itb system.
    • The training arrangements remained essentially employer based and industry oriented.
    • Vocational educational interests were represented on the itbs, but did not have full voting rights on the levy.
      Chapter five direct government interventions early schemes.
• the industrial training board system, set up in 1964 and based on a grant/levy mechanims without major government funding, was failing to deliver the traning which was needed. That system was substatnitally changed by hte Employment Training Act 1973, under which a centralised national training body, the Manpower Services Commission (MSC) was set up.
• The amount of training and re-training of adults in order to match the shift in the pattern of demand for skills was increased by the Training Oppurtnities Programme, which had been started in 1972
• the governments first major direct intervention in the labour market in peace time, and it is important for that reason, was directed to alleviating total unemployment. The instrument used was the Temporary Employment Subsidy (TES). That scheme was started in August 1975 and continued to 1979.
  • The economic influences and consequences of the TES has been assesed elsewhre (Deakin and Pratten 1982) and found to have achieved some success
  • By the end of 1978 the cumulative total of employees who had at any time been supproted by TES represetned 6.1 per cent of all employees in manugfacturing industry and 2.2 per cent of all employees in Britian
    Other labour market interventions followed Tes their aim was job presentation by encouraging short term working in effect, subsidized there were the short-ter compensation scheme stwcs 1978 and later the temporary short time working compensation scheme tstwcs 1979.

The number of school leavers who are unemployed increased sixfold from 13, 11974 to 81, 1976 as a proportion of total unemployment which is also writing fast in this. Lloyds school leavers represents 2.2 total in 1974 and 6.3 in 1976.

The population youth cohort age 16 to 19 increased marketly during the 1970s the size of this cohort 1971 was 2.9 1991 it was 23.5% larger at 3.6 reflecting the much higher birth rates of 1960s.

The weakening of demand for youth labour which was much more mocked than that for labor as a holes considered to have been due to two main factors first a shift away from demand for the more traditional craft skills which had been mainly provided by apprenticeships and secondly the much research and debated Influence upon the demand of youth labour of the world documented rise in the pay of young people relatives that adults

The government acted by direct intervention in the youth labour market starting in 1975 at first on a small scale

Recruitment subsidy for school levers RSSL
The subsidy scheme was introduced in October 1975 in that month there were 65, employers were offered five pound per week for six months per school lever recruited by the end of June 1976 29,000 approved but by that time they have been 5,000 levers from scheme

The department of employment commissioned a survey of participants in the rssl (department of employment Gazette 1977 July Page 696) the results were disappointing in March 1976 76% of sample firm status that they would have recruited as many school leavers since October's 1975 without the subsidy the rssl was terminated in October 1976 and was replaced by the youth employment subsidy

Youth employment subsidy YES
This substitute was aimed at the mortis advantage among the youth cohort age 16 to 20

The terms of the yes a payment to employers of 10 pound per week for a. of 6 weeks forever recruit under 20 who had been unemployed for six months or more (department of employment Gazette 1976 August Page 827-828)

The y e s was in operation from October 1976 to February 1978 in July 1976 there are approximately 44,000 unemployed for six months or more by the end of February 1978 38, 97 young people have been supported by Yas at a cost to the government of 8.7 (department employment Gazette 1978 April Page 424-425)

Employers in sample reported that 75% of the substance Young who is would events their employment regardless of the subsidy and that of the remaining 25% only one half were filling jobs which would not have gone to an adult person in the absence of this study

Work experience program WEP
This program provides a subsidized work experience places in industry for young people age 16 to 18 it was started in September 1976 and ended as a separate program early in 1978 and so was approached me concurrent with the y e s the WEP continued with the same objectives and criteria as a part of the youth opportunities program Why op which was started in 1978 and which is described analyzed the next section

Trainees will paid on allowance of 18 pound per week which was not liable for income tax or National Insurance contributions for a program of 26 weeks in most cases

Employers received no payment for running awep a total of 44, 51 w e p places were available at the end of 1977 by then 34,000 on the program in 13500 been on it making the total number of entrance 47, 500 (lasco 1978)

The basic result in these terms was that 61% of all participants obtained a four-time job under the scheme all after leaving before completion

Not until the new training initiative of 1981 did they very seriously turn to measures to promote youth training as a means of reducing youth unemployment and the major waste of resources which was there by being occurred

Youth opportunities program YOP
In 1977 annual average youth unemployment for school leavers were still very high at 99,000 representing 7% of total unemployment and unemployment rate of 11.8 sent percent

The MSc produced the youth opportunities program which started in March of 1978 in April 1978 29,300 young people age between 16 and 18 were in the program and by September 58, 600

The scale of the program is set out in total there were 1 million 834, 700 million entrance to the yop including 4,100 still on the program in 1983 to 84 after it had been replaced by the youth training scheme YTS in April of 1983

There were three basic schemes within the youth opportunities program
Work experience places the majority of these were at the premises of private sector employees for up to six months
Work preparation places these were short courses of about 13 weeks skill centers colleges of further education and employees premises providing remedial education and basic literacy and numeracy
New training places these were not offered under yop until 1982 they were instituted as part of the transition to the youth training scheme YTS which was started in 1983 and places were for 12 months with time divided to the sponsors premises or inflammation technology centers and colleges of Further Education

Maybe seeing from these data that the wire p was basically a work experience scheme of 70% of participants were on that part of the scheme in each of the year's shown each entrance paid 19 pound 50 per week free of income tax national insurance at the start of the program in 1978 by 1982 this allowance participants have been increased to 25 pounds per week

Should be noted the participants in the yacht were to some degree to advanted they were school levers or other young people age 16 17 improves the failed to gain entry to higher offer that education or permanent employment on their own merits and some needed remedial teaching in literacy and numeracy the yacht helped about 60% of entrance either to get employment or to get onto other schemes and courses which might be expected to increase their employability

Chapter 6, the development of the modern system of youth training
A new conservative government was elected in 1979 and soon adopted the last affair free market approach to economic policy however with the youth lab market massive DC equilibrium supplied being far in six of demand the interventions policies adapted by the Labour government in the late 1970s had to be continued

On the supply side the demographic situation fairly simple policymakers in the early 1980s was one of relatively stable numbers of schools there were 887,000 1979 to 80 and 100 911,000 1982 to 83 these numbers are high compared with those which followed later in the decade and the demographic bulge due to High birth rates in 1960s had passed

The yacht which had been introduced on our scale in 1978 have provided work experience only although in 1982 are training element had been added

The number of apprentices in manufacturing Industries was halved pretty 1965 and 1982 c table 6.2

From 1979 to 1982 the very serious imbalance in the youth lab market which has been described on the decline in apprenticeships the MSc issued in May 1981 and consultative paper under the title new training initiative let's set out three major national objectives for future industrial training the government's white paper under the title a new training initiative a program of action presented department in December 1981

In the new training initiative the chief policy proposals for youth labor placed the accent upon training and contrast the earlier policy of alleviating new unemployment board providing work experience in places of industry

The central proposals for the youth labour market which were carried into effect were one the design and implementation of the youth training scheme white yes proposals one and four two the setting up of the young workers scheme yws which aimed to improve the job security and training of young people under 18 by lowering their ways rates relative to those of older workers 3 the setting up of more vocational relevant courses for those still in educational system by the establishment among other measures the technical and vocational educational initiative tvi and 4 a start on the road to a better understanding of the economics of training and of the financial management of the training processes

The authors of the white papers saw the problem in the following terms in 1979 there was 40% of the 700,000 he found jobs receive no training at all about another 20% receiving training for only eight weeks or less

The technical and vocational educational initiative tvei was introduced in 1982 to provide pupils age 14 with a four-year of full time technical vocational and general education including appropriate work experience and leading to recognise qualifications

Looking ahead to 1991 it is interesting to note that under the terms of the new national curriculum the TV ei is supported with general technical and vocational subjects being given equal status with nutritional academic subjects

Chapter 7, the first stage in the voicational education and training sequence
TV ei
The TV ei was now announced on 12th November 1982 the announcement of the tvi was completely unexpected the local educational authorities Leas had not been previously consulted and at first they regards it as an invasion of their territory (NATHFE journal December 1982 page 3)

In 1987 the TV ei was introduced into all state secondary schools the transitional three-year prep projects in schools that have not run pilots (luke 1991 page 543)

The content of tvi courses appeared her varied a good deal there was no set curriculum

The national curriculum NC was established by the Education Reform Act 1988 May the teaching of technology obligatory of all stupid holes age 5 to 16 and it was intended to provide the detailed framework and of curriculum in assessment within all schools including tvi projects all operate

There have been some severe criticisms of the TV Ei the critics divide broadly into three groups the first hm inspectorative schools HMI had some cruises of the organization of the development of the TV er the second were those who took the view that the needs of employers dominated the skin too much and the third considered that the needs of employers did not sufficiently influence the teaching done under the TV ei

Under the weight of these criticisms the government called in July 1992 for a review of the teaching of technology as provided for under the national curriculum

There have been some achievements for the tvi the following have been assembled from several different sources of a cohort of post 16 year old tvi students nearly 10% took in 1991 by the national Foundation of for educational research and NF e.r four year study running from 1990 to 1994 it found that compact and improved pupil motivation and increased employer involvement in Inner City schools more than half the combat school surveyed had noted improvements in student motivation

Three routes to post school educational and training
An age 16 they're now exists three alternative routes available to young people who wish to achieve educational vocational qualifications but on those obtained at school the first the general academic route by A-levels count to full-time education of vocational education of several years duration the second the route to National vocational qualifications in the cues which are occupation occupational qualifications designed for those and employment or in training positions such as the YTS with an employer the third the route to what have been named vocational A-levels was your obtained by staying on full time within school and further education system and studying for vocational qualifications named general national court vocational qualifications gnvqs

National vocational qualifications
In parallel with the development of the TV ei but before its extension to all states secondary schools in 1987 the government took further initiative in 1985 by setting up committee to review the whole system of vocational qualifications the outcome was a white paper working together education and training 1986 which recommends the setting up of a new National Council for vocational qualifications the ncvq

The basic problems which appear to be arising from the new envy Q system and that the craft skills are to be learned almost holy on the job that is done because the theorist will knowledge required to carry out the tasks is set to be embedded in them (smithers 1993 page 20)

The YTS system is linked in to the MVQ format of qualifications and yt entrance have to attend courses design to reach envyq level 2

General national vocational qualifications
Further set was taken by the government in 1991 when a white paper was published this paper proposed policies aimed at improving full-time play some and training for 16 to 19 year olds

In November 1991 the government is instituted a new set of NVQs in the comments with the white paper they were named general NVQs they are designed to be A-level accordingly requiring much broader and deeper understanding of general principles than the occupationally specific NVQs which of those who have left school and are engaged in training it was projected that by 1995 about 25% of all 16 to 19 year olds would be working towards GMV Q's

There have been severe criticisms of the teaching of these newfigration of courses the grounds criticism are that the courses that you shallow and that the teaching of the principles particularly Mathematics and knowledge of theory which are the foundation for the technologies is seriously deficient (smithers 993 page 32)

However it is abundantly clear that the quality of school teaching under the TV ei and for the new gnvqs is seriously deficient in terms of both syllabus and method and particularly in respect for teaching of Mathematics and the knowledge of theory which is needed for a complete understanding of the applied vocational subjects which are contained in the gnvq courses there's also clear that changes in the distribution of time between the teaching of theory and practical work on the job have been to the disadvantage of quality in the occupational based NVQ system

Chapter 9, an assessment of the economic effects of the YTS upon employment and employers
The inception of the youth training scheme YTS was now by the Manpower service commission in 1982 and it came into operation in 1983 in succession to the youth opportunities program yup then chairman of the MSc Mr David Young speaking at a conference in Birmingham Birmingham in June 1982 said the YTS is not about an unemployment this is about bringing nearly half a million employment unemployed beyond people into a single integrated program giving high-quality for work (employment Gazette 1992 July page 275)

The following was its initial form
It was for a. of months and was open 16 17 year old school leavers for remain unemployed under some employed 16 year olds
There were two modes mode a places were sponsored by private sector employees and were sent on factories officers and other places of work this won the large majority of all YTS places my B places were community projects sponsored by local authorities and voluntary organisations particularly those in Inner City areas where there was a shortage of employer LED schemes
Some places on the mode B or provided at information technology centres
Each trainee was paid an alliance of 25 pounds per week
Some employers who participated in the mode a scheme did so as managing agents for the YTS there were paid initially 1950 pounds per year for each trainee there's some comprised by management agency of 100 pounds 1300 pounds for the trainings allowance and 550 pound torque training costs
On the mode a the training program comprise on the job training at the employees premieres integrating 13 weeks off the job training as to technical college or training school but the latter was not brought into effect at beginning of scheme

The YTS started the lower level of 121,500 in the year to March 1984 but then built up to a peak of 388,100 on average in the year 1989

This support via YTS was 6% higher than the peak support by the yacht in 1982 to 83

In 1982 the number of young people available for the labour market was 1 million 897, and of these 242, available off 13.2% and onto the yacht in 1988 about 1,6 7,000 available for the labour market and of these three hundred and ninety seven thousand 94. Went into white yes this percentage was 23.9 play for 19 to 87 and 23. Set for 1989 so nearly a quarter of all 16 to 18 year olds who did not stay in full-time Ed into the YTS in these years

Chapter 12, the devloution of intervention and the movement towards quasi-markets
Well it was set up in 1983 the YTS was organised by the MSc on a national basis and was directed centrally previous government interventions in the Labour market had also been centralised except for the industrial training wards itvs which have been set up in 1964 on an industry basis

The first step in the Devolution process was made when the MST was disbanded and the training commission later the Training Agency ta was set up in 1988 the administration of the YTS was there for organised through local and regional offices later in 1989 and 1990 this process of devolution was taken an important step further by the establishment of 82 training and Enterprise councils tecs in England and Wales and 22 local Enterprise companies lec's in Scotland the TA was succeeded by the training educational Enterprise directive teed which together with another newly established body the national training task force mttf directed the setting up of the tech and leg system

The function of the nttf was defect the quality of the bids to set up the text and lacks it was abolished in 1992 when that job had been completed

The text organized on a local basis local employers local providers of vocational education and trade union representatives provided to play an active role by the becoming directors of the text and running the government's intervention in the field of the YTS employment training et for adults out of work for more than six months the business growth training scene BGT and various types of information technology training so six years after this abstract of YTS in 1993 Devolution integration with local private and public sector employees and would local providers vocational education became the pattern of Organization for the government's major intervention in the Labour youth market

The YTS was changed the youth training the yt which was done in May 1990 the rationale for this was to provide the new text with a youth training scheme which was basically the YTS with added flexibility to enable the text to match supply more closely with demand in the local youth labour markets and also to raise a tail of vocational qualifications in terms of both level and number

The main changes to convert YTS to yt or officially stated as follows
And emphasis upon outputs rather than training processes
Flexible design of individual schemes to achieve outputs instead of a fixed national resign structure
The two and one year YTS enticement to give wives trading programs of their injuration suitable for six type of courses and type of training need involved
The promise of course is standard of at least level two as laid down by the National Council for vacation of qualifications and vq or it equivalent occupational training or educational standards in addition more purchase of training at NVQ levels three and four
Allowances to unemploy trainees based upon age rather than cumulative time and training
Improved assessment in endorsement procedures for special trading needs
Extension of the guarantee of a yt place to include certain groups of entry into training has been unavoidably delayed
More scope for discretionary entry for people not covered by the guarantee

The outcome and relative success of widesian achieving it saying to largely remain to be seen the number of young people training with within the yt scheme was three hundred 350,000 play 1991 at that time just over a year after its inception 89% of those who were completed their training underweighty had game jobs and 67% had obtained some vocational qualifications (bridges 1991)

Yt was introduced in April of 1990 and the rate of attainment of four qualification for all yt levers fell each year to reach 32% in 1992 to 93 but the pre 1990 qualifications under YTS were generally at a low level anyway

More decision-making was devolved to the trainees this was done by a system of youth credits which is called training credits or vouchers pilot schemes test these was announced announced Commons on March of 1990 the youth credit scheme was designed in the following terms
Young people age 16 to 17 who plan to leave school discuss their job prospects with their school careers advisor
If they decide to take a youth credit is supplied by their local tech
School levers may obtain job straight away and that case they discuss with their employee how to use their credits
During training employers pay the trainees to set and yt allowance where that applies and record their progress
On completion of training trainees received their qualifications MVQ level 2 or a bar that's required by the conditions of these credit scheme

The value of these credits at the time of their instruction was when they're in the range of 500 to 5,000 what is the type of occupation

These credit scheme expanded the range of choice of career open to new trainers and it converter upon them as a significant degree of decision-making add the earliest most crucial stage in their working lives
The new modern apprenticeship system was announced in 1994 it was expected to be an operation by December 1995 I will be supported financial by the government through the medium of the youth scheme the monopreneurships will be admitted by the text and will be for two or three years they will aim to equip young people with technician craft and supervisory skills at MVQ level 3 and above the target side of the new scheme is 150,000 people at any one time