Federal Policy

Nuance on Skills

/ The Old Crank

When the New York Times publishes a scathing editorial against the whole notion of a skills gap, it alarms me, because so much of adult education and training advocacy has coalesced around this idea. It also alarms me because whatever the economic data tells us about the root causes of unemployment, it doesn’t take away from the fact that we still have a substantial number of people who are trying to improve their basic skills, enroll in job training programs, and/or acquire industry credentials. We wouldn’t have waiting lists for services if this wasn’t the case.

Many economists have been arguing for some time that the skills gap has not been a major cause of unemployment. But a case for investing in skills doesn’t need to be dependent on this argument. I’ve often cited an old blog post from Jared Bernstein as an example of a way to argue for skills that isn’t dependent on proof of a skills gap.

The Times piece suggests that skills gap arguments will be increasingly met with skepticism. It’s going to be important not to let that turn into an argument against investing in skills altogether.

Self-Promotion Sunday

/ The Old Crank

The Committee for Education Funding, a coalition of (mostly) national educational groups, released their annual response to the President’s 2014 budget proposal released on May 29th. (It was delayed due to the fact that the President’s budget was delayed.) This book is delivered to every member of Congress.

The section on the Adult Education and Family Literacy Act (AEFLA), which I wrote (hence the self-promotion) on behalf of the National Coalition for Literacy, is on page 133 at this link (or you can just click here for the AEFLA section alone). It’s really more of a revision/edit of last year’s section. This year we also included a short anecdote, contributed by another NCL member, to start things off, which hopefully provides readers with a sense of what this funding actually means to people.

Anyway, I wanted to mention it here because I figured that some of you may find a quick summary of adult literacy funding under AEFLA (i.e. Title II of WIA) to be useful in your own advocacy efforts.

It also gives me a chance to recommend the CEF book, which really serves as much more than just a response to the President’s budget—it includes a history of education funding over the last ten years for nearly every federal education program, and includes lots of charts and graphs making the case for the federal investment in education.

Helpful Pointer to Charitable Deduction Proposals

/ The Old Crank

In case you missed it, the House Ways and Means Committee released a 558-page (!) report earlier this month detailing a range of options for overhauling the tax code. For those of us who work in the nonprofit sector, the report is of some significance because it  summarizes all of the proposals for limiting or changing the charitable tax deduction that have been bandied about over the last several years. A recent article in the Chronicle of Philanthropy  helpfully pointed out that the section on charitable giving begins on page 491.

Senate Workforce Investment Act Reauthorization Proposal May Tie Funding to GDP

/ The Old Crank

Interesting post from Neil Bomberg of the National League of Cities:

Earlier this week and in a meeting with NLC, Sens. Patty Murray (D-WA) and Johnny Isakson’s (R-GA) offices announced the framework for the Senate WIA reauthorization bill. NLC welcomed the good news that the bipartisan measure will likely retain the current state and local governance structures, including a strong role for local elected officials and business leaders with local workforce development areas based on local labor markets or economic regions rather than political boundaries. The Senators’ offices also indicated there will be an effort to move forward with “smart consolidation,” which means taking a measured and evidence-based approach to program elimination and consolidation, and to avoid consolidating programs simply for the sake of consolidation. Finally, the offices indicated an interest in basing workforce development funding on a percentage of the overall gross domestic product (GDP) with expenditures increasing during economic downturns expenditures so that unemployed workers are able to receive the assistance they need. (my emphasis)

That last idea (that I bolded) is new to me. Interesting.