From MDRC, this report presents findings from Britain’s Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) demonstration program, which was designed to improve the employment prospects of low-paid and long-term unemployed individuals. Researchers analyzed take-up, service delivery, and outcomes of the program and found that the program increased the likelihood of participants taking occupationally relevant courses and training, which may have been impacted by advisory support and financial incentives.

This report summarizes the final impact results for the national Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) project. This project tested, using a random assignment design, the effectiveness of numerous programs intended to promote steady work and career advancement. All the programs targeted current and former welfare recipients and other low-wage workers, most of whom were single mothers. Given that earlier retention and advancement initiatives studied for these groups were largely not effective, ERA sought to examine a variety of programs that states and localities had developed for different populations, to determine whether effective strategies could be identified. In short, nine of the twelve programs examined in this report do not appear to be effective, but three programs increased employment levels, employment stability, and/or earnings, relative to control group levels, after three to four years of follow-up.

Key Findings:

 - Out of the twelve programs included in the report, three ERA programs produced positive economic impacts; nine did not. All three programs increased employment retention and advancement. Increases in employment retention and earnings were largest and most consistent over time in the Texas ERA program in Corpus Christi (one of three sites that operated this program); the Chicago ERA program; and the Riverside County, California, Post-Assistance Self-Sufficiency (PASS) ERA program. These programs increased annual earnings by between 7 percent and 15 percent relative to control group levels. Each of them served a different target group, which suggests that employment retention and advancement programs can work for a range of populations. However, three-fourths of the ERA programs included in this report did not produce gains in targeted outcomes beyond what control group members were able to attain on their own with the existing services and supports available in the ERA sites.

 - Increases in participation beyond control group levels were not consistent or large, which may have made it difficult for the programs to achieve impacts on employment retention and advancement. Engaging individuals in employment and retention services at levels above what they would have done in the absence of the programs was a consistent challenge. In addition, staff had to spend a lot of time and resources on placing unemployed individuals back into jobs, which made it difficult for them to focus on helping those who were already working to keep their jobs or move up.

Before the ERA project began, there was not much evidence about the types of programs that could improve employment retention and advancement outcomes for current or former welfare recipients. The ERA evaluation provides valuable insights about the nature of retention and advancement problems and it underscores a number of key implementation challenges that a program would have to address. In addition, it reveals shortcomings in a range of common approaches now in use, while identifying three distinct approaches that seem promising and worthy of further exploration. (author abstract)

This 12-page practitioner brief focuses on one aspect of the ERA programs — that is, their strategies to reemploy the many program participants who quickly lost jobs. Limited rigorous evidence is available on reemployment strategies. Moreover, the ERA evaluation was not designed to test the effectiveness of the specific strategies discussed in this document. However, the experiences — successful or not — across the ERA programs can provide important lessons for developing or operating employment programs for current and former welfare recipients. The reemployment services that were offered to newly unemployed individuals are similar to job placement services in programs that target unemployed populations generally, but there are differences, particularly in using recent job loss as a learning tool in finding the next job.

While preventing job loss can be an appropriate goal for retention and advancement programs, the ERA study illustrates how challenging it is to keep individuals in a particular job. Programs might consider redefining “retention” as sustained employment across jobs rather than as sustained employment in any one job. The focus in this brief is on how to address job loss once it has happened: structuring job search and job placement services for those who have recently lost their jobs, with the goal of reducing the length of unemployment, improving the quality of the new job over the previous one, and achieving greater employment stability over time. The lessons address three overarching questions:

How can programs learn about participants’ job losses quickly?

Which strategies might contribute to faster reemployment?

How can managers organize staff and resources to address job loss?  (author abstract)

Although much is known about how to help welfare recipients find jobs, little is known about how to help them and other low-wage workers keep jobs or advance in the labor market. This report presents information on the effectiveness of a program in Chicago that aimed to help employed welfare recipients increase their earnings. The program was tested as part of the Employment Retention and Advancement Project (ERA), which is studying 15 programs across the country. The ERA project was conceived by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; it is being conducted by MDRC under contract to ACF, with additional funding from the U.S. Department of Labor. The Chicago ERA program, which operated from February 2002 to June 2004, targeted recipients of Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) cash assistance benefits who appeared to be stuck in low-paying jobs: individuals who worked at least 30 hours per week for at least six consecutive months but earned so little that they remained eligible for TANF benefits. The program, which was funded by the Illinois Department of Human Services (DHS) and operated under contract to DHS by Employment and Employer Services, sought to help participants advance in their current jobs or move to higher-paying jobs. The Chicago ERA program is being evaluated using a random assignment research design, whereby eligible individuals were assigned, through a lottery-like process, to one of two groups. Those assigned to the ERA group were recruited for the program and, if they remained on TANF, were required to participate. Those assigned to the control group were neither required nor permitted to participate in ERA, but they could obtain other services from DHS or other organizations. (author abstract)

Over the past decade, state and federal welfare policies have increasingly emphasized moving welfare recipients into jobs, and over this time period large numbers of recipients have gone to work. As welfare recipients enter the labor market they join other groups of disadvantaged and less-skilled workers seeking jobs, including ex-offenders, high-school drop-outs, less-educated young black men, and single mothers who are not receiving welfare. These workers all face similar challenges in the labor market: finding jobs that offer benefits and relatively high wages, retaining jobs once found, and finding opportunities for advancement. Most past research in this area has focused on the workers themselves—the supply side of the labor market—and what individual characteristics are associated with better jobs and advancement. This is only half the equation. Understanding the hiring practices, job requirements, and workplace policies of employers—the demand side—can provide considerable information to policy makers interested in promoting work and advancement among welfare recipients and other less-skilled workers. To this end, in 2007 the authors fielded a nationally representative survey of private-sector employers to provide information about employers’ practices and workplace policies relevant for less-skilled workers. They gathered information on employer characteristics, job requirements, wages and benefits, hiring practices, and potential for advancement. The survey focuses on employers’ most recently filled jobs that require no more education than a high school degree or GED; we refer to these jobs as non-college jobs. This group of jobs includes both entry-level jobs—-those requiring minimal skills and experience—-as well as “next-level” jobs—-non-college jobs demanding higher skill and experience and potentially offering higher wages and benefits. The rest of this Executive Summary outlines major findings and gives a brief discussion of the implications for policy. Exhibit E1 at the end of the Executive Summary is a chart of major findings. (author abstract)

This report presents implementation and two-year effectiveness results for the Reach for Success (RFS) program, operated by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Social Services (DPSS). RFS offered individualized and flexible case management services to recipients of Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) cash assistance benefits –– primarily, single mothers who were working at least 32 hours per week but earned too little to leave assistance. DPSS administrators designed RFS with the goal of helping individuals retain their employment and secure better jobs, and it sought to meet this goal by increasing the availability and improving the quality of case management services, relative to services offered as part of the agency’s existing post-employment services (PES) program. Participation in services in either program was voluntary. RFS operated from March 2002 to June 2005 in three regions in the county. RFS is one of 16 innovative models across the country being evaluated as part of the Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) project under contract to the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, with additional funding from the U.S. Department of Labor. The evaluation of RFS uses a random assignment research design, whereby eligible individuals were assigned, through a lottery-like process, to one of two groups. Those assigned to the RFS group were actively recruited to participate in services and were offered personalized case management. Those assigned to the control group were eligible to request, on their own initiative, services from the county’s existing post-employment program. The report’s findings thus indicate whether Los Angeles’s new RFS program was more effective than its existing approach to providing post-employment services. (author abstract)

Considerable interest exists among state and local welfare departments, workforce investment agencies, community colleges, and other nonprofit community-based service providers to find ways to promote job retention and advancement among employed welfare recipients and other low-wage working families. Little is known, however, about what services are effective. The Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) evaluation, designed to provide more information about what works in this area, is the largest and most comprehensive study of its kind. Conceived and sponsored by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the evaluation is being conducted under contract by MDRC, a nonprofit, nonpartisan social policy research organization. The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has provided additional funding for the project. As of December 2002, a total of 15 ERA programs are being tested in 8 states. This report describes the initial experiences of those programs, focusing on implementation issues and institutional connections. (author abstract)