The Economics of Vocational and Technical Education

The role of structural factors in the national unemployment experi? ence in recent years [Killingsworth, Galla way] suggests the importance of updating the supply of labor services. Technological change as well as shifts in consumers' preferences with respect to final goods have brought about changes in relative demand schedules for various types of labor services. The resulting unemployment could then be effectively reduced and relief brought to those who bear the cost of technical progress by modifications in the supply of labor. Vocational and technical training programs could be expected to perform yet another important function?upgrading the quality of the existing supply of labor. The result is an improvement in the productivity of the flow of labor services, and an upward displacement of the total product schedule of labor. Furthermore, technical and vocational educa? tion can contribute to the long-run solution of poverty by increasing the potential earning power of those at the lower income scale. The essential analytical expectation is, of course, that systematic relations exist between investment in training and skill development on the one hand, and the flow of benefits on the other. [Somers and Stroms dorfer; Carroll and Ihnen; Kaufman; Corazzini; Hu, Lee and Stroms

Economic growth · Economics · Goods and services · Investment (military) · Labour economics · Management · Market economy · Political science · Product (mathematics) · Productivity · Quality (philosophy) · Scale (ratio) · Schedule · Structural unemployment · Technical change · Unemployment · Vocational education · Education Systems and Policy · Labor market dynamics and wage inequality