Assessing the effectiveness of training and temporary employment schemes: some results from the youth labour market

Abstract

This paper suggests some ways in which labour market programmes of training and temporary employment should be evaluated. Essentially such programmes should be evaluated relative to the counter factual: what would have happened to participants had they not participated? The paper discusses the problems of modelling this counter factual and applies the resulting methods to data on a cohort of school leavers followed over a five and a half year period during the late 1980s.