Monday, July 20, 2015

Clio Chang — Apprenticeship Explainer: Why Politicians Are Pitching Them


Last month, Hillary Clinton revealed her new plan for tackling youth unemployment: offering a $1,500 federal tax credit to businesses for every apprentice they hire, with a bonus for apprentices under age 25.
Clinton’s tax credit proposal builds upon an already successful South Carolina state apprenticeship program known as Apprenticeship Carolina, a partnership with South Carolina’s Technical College System which offers a $1,000 tax credit to employers per apprentice per year. Since 2007, the number of Registered Apprentices in South Carolina has increased from 777 to 8,000 and employer participation has shot up an enormous 570 percent, offering programs in fields as varied as advanced manufacturing, healthcare, hospitality, and culinary arts.
The apprenticeship system is widely and successfully used today in other countries, such as the United Kingdom and Germany, where apprentices make up 2.7 and 3.7 percent of the workforce, respectively. These percentages are high in comparison to the United States, where only 0.2 percent of the workforce is in a registered apprenticeship.
More importantly, when evaluating youth employment and training programs in the U.S., the apprenticeship model has some of the strongest data showing increases in lifetime earnings.…
The Century Foundation
Apprenticeship Explainer: Why Politicians Are Pitching Them
Clio Chang

4 comments:

Ryan Harris said...

If only every article about what is wrong with government and society were accompanied by solutions, in the way that this article does, then people would be less angry at government.

Peter Pan said...

Establish social contacts, get paid to learn and avoid student debt. This is a no brainer. And for many people, the classroom setting is not conducive to learning.

Ageism in this case, however.

Matt Franko said...

$1500 is not nearly enough. .. maybe if it was $15,000 ...

Tom Hickey said...

Gee, Matt, that's a lot of money. Do you think the country can afford it? :)