Studies in the News is a very current compilation of items significant to the Legislature and Governor's Office. It is created weekly by the State Library's Research Bureau to supplement the public policy debate in California’s Capitol. To help share the latest information with state policymakers, these reading lists are now being made accessible through the State Library’s website. This week's list of current articles in various public policy areas is presented below.

Service to State Employees:

• When available, the URL for the full text of each item is provided.

• California State Employees may contact the State Information & Reference Center (916-654-0206; cslsirc@library.ca.gov) with the SITN issue number and the item number [S#].

• All other interested individuals should contact their local library - the items may be available there, or may be borrowed by your local library on your behalf.

ECONOMY

INCOME

The Rising Tide Left Some Boats Behind. By California Budget Project. (The Project, Sacramento, California) December 2005. 25 p.

Full Text at: www.cbp.org/2005/0511_bareport.pdf

["The study focuses on the divergence between wage growth at the top and the earnings squeeze at the bottom for workers in the nine county Bay Area.... High-wage workers' pay rose 30.5 percent during this period. But during the same period, wage earners in the region at the bottom of the scale who earned $11.50 per hour in 2004 saw their inflation-adjusted wages fall 4.6 percent." San Francisco Chronicle (December 14, 2005) 1.

[Request #S60401]

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Employment During the 2001-2003 Recovery. By the Congressional Budget Office. (The Office, Washington, DC) August 2005. 23 p.

Full Text at: www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/65xx/doc6599/08-05-Jobs.pdf

[“This background paper examines job growth following the 2001 recession. After declining by about 1.6 million jobs during that recession, employment fell by more than an additional million jobs in the first 18 months following the end of the recession. Understanding why employment fell even as output recovered can be useful both in assessing the labor market and in forecasting the path of employment during future recessions.”]

[Request #S60402]

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LA Labor Market: Strengths and Weaknesses. By Brent Haydamack and others, Economic Roundtable. (Economic Roundtable, Los Angeles, California) December 2005. 37 p.

Full Text at: www.economicrt.org/pub/la_lm_strengths_weaknesses/la_lm_strengths_weaknesses.pdf

["This report provides a profile of the Los Angeles City labor market, including: geographic distribution and educational achievement of resident workers; industries and occupations of resident workers; employer reported private sector jobs in Los Angeles; geographic distribution, size distribution and survival rates of LA employers; and industry filtering to identify target industries for job training and economic development."]

[Request #S60403]

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Insight 2005: A Survey of U.S. Technology Innovators. By Electronic Engineering Times and McClenahan Communications. (McClenahan, Portland, Orogan) 2005. 4 p.

Full Text at: www.mcbru.com/pdf/Insight2005_ExecSummary.pdf

["U.S. engineers are worried about job security and fearful that the nation may be losing its technological lead over foreign rivals. The study, conducted by the trade publication Electronic Engineering Times and the Oregon communications firm McClenahanBruer, also found widespread movement to work centers overseas of such engineering tasks as hardware and software design."]

[Request #S60404]

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Offshoring of Services: An Overview of the Issues. By Government Accountability Office. (The Office, Washington, DC) November 2005. 85 p.

Full Text at: www.gao.gov/new.items/d065.pdf

["Much attention has focused on the 'offshoring' of services to lower-wage locations abroad.... This report: 1) provides an overview of experts' views on the potential impacts of services offshoring; 2) describes the types of policies that have been proposed in response to offshoring and 3) highlights some key areas where additional research might help advance the debate about offshoring."]

[Request #S60405]

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Hopeful Workers, Marginal Jobs: Los Angeles's Off-the-books Labor Force. By Daniel Flaming and others, Economic Roundtable. Prepared for the Los Angeles Economy Project. (Economic Roundtable, Los Angeles, California) December 2005. 67 p.

Full Text at: www.economicrt.org/pub/hopeful_workers_marginal_jobs/hopeful_workers_marginal_jobs.pdf

["This is a report on Los Angeles's informal economy, with estimates of: the number of informal workers; their geographic distribution within Los Angeles; the industries that use informal labor; and the resulting deficit in contributions to the social safety net."]

[Request #S60406]

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EMPLOYMENT

DISABLED WORKERS

Opportunities for Too Few? Oversight of Federal Employment Programs for Persons with Disabilities. By Michael R. Enzi and others. U. S. Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. (The Committee, Washington, DC) October 20, 2005. 13 p.

Full Text at: help.senate.gov/O&I.pdf

["A Senate report is criticizing nonprofit groups that employ people with disabilities for handing out excessive salaries and benefits to their top executives.... The report includes PRIDE and four other nonprofits as examples of abuse and corporate greed that could be contributing to the poor performance of two federal programs established in the 1930s to create jobs for the blind and disabled." Sacramento Bee (October 25, 2005) 1.]

[Request #S60407]

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On the Fringe: The Substandard Benefits of Workers in Part-time, Temporary, and Contract Jobs. By Elaine Ditsler and others, Iowa Policy Project. (The Commonwealth Fund, New York, New York) December 2005. 32 p.

Full Text at: www.cmwf.org/usr_doc/Ditsler_onthefringe_879.pdf

["This report focuses on ... the increasing prevalence of workers in 'nonstandard' jobs and the decline in access to employer-provided health insurance. While the ongoing crisis in employer-sponsored health insurance has garnered much attention, there has been little focus on the status of workers in nonstandard work arrangements. These workers are particularly vulnerable -— their sporadic employment status often excludes them from employer-based coverage. This report offers policy options to reach these uninsured, nonstandard workers and their families."]

[Request #S60408]

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Income of U.S. Workforce Projected to Decline If Education Doesn't Improve. By The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education. (The Center, Washington, DC) November 2005. 8 p.

Full Text at: www.highereducation.org/reports/pa_decline/pa_decline.pdf

["If current trends continue, the proportion of workers with high school diplomas and college degrees will decrease and the personal income of Americans will decline over the next 15 years.... In addition, a drop in the average level of education of U.S. workers would depress personal income levels for Americans, in turn creating a corresponding decrease in the nation's tax base."]

[Request #S60409]

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Declining Share of Adults Receiving Training under WIA are Low-Income or Disadvantaged. By Abbey Frank and Elisa Minoff. Center for Law and Social Policy. (CLASP, Washington, DC) December 14, 2005. 8 p.

Full Text at: www.clasp.org/publications/decline_in_wia_training.pdf

[The Workforce Investment Act of 1998 (WIA) significantly changed the way in which federally funded job training and employment services are accessed and funded. The new structure, designed to increase access to a broader array of services, has had an unintended consequence: a decline in the number of individuals who receive training under WIA. The number of adults exiting the program who received training was 17 percent lower in 2003 than in 1998, the last full year of WIA's predecessor program, the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA)."]

[Request #S60413]

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The Economics of Citywide Minimum Wages: The San Francisco Model. By Michael Reigh and others. UC Berkeley Institute of Industrial Relations. (The Institute, Berkeley, California) January 2006. 12 p.

Full Text at: www.iir.berkeley.edu/research/sfminimumwage.pdf

[“A 2-year-old city law that boosted San Francisco’s minimum wage – from $6.75 an hour to $8.82 this year – hasn’t hurt the city’s economy or its businesses, according to a report…. The study … found that a gradual rise in San Francisco’s minimum wage hadn’t spurred layoffs or business failures, although advocates for local businesses most affected by the law say they are feeling a financial pinch. Michael Reigh … one of the authors, said he was surprised by the data he analyzed and said it should encourage other cities and states to raise their minimum wage levels.” San Francisco Chronicle (January 4, 2005) 1.]

[Request #S60411]

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Serving the Public: Managing the State Workforce to Improve Outcomes. By Little Hoover Commission. (The Commission, Sacramento, California) 2005. 75 p.

Full Text at: www.lhc.ca.gov/lhcdir/181/report181.pdf

[“In this study, the Commission examined procedures for hiring, training, managing and rewarding state managers and found a system that is engineered for failure…. This report contains recommendations that could begin to immediately improve the ability of state departments to recruit, hire, develop, manage and compensate the administrators that California needs and Californians deserve. All of these recommendations are standard practice in some other public sector organizations. Most of the proposals do not require significant fiscal investments, but all of them could contribute to a State that is more effective, and thus more efficient.”]

[Request #S60412]

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Decent Work in America: The State-by-state Work Environment Index, 2005. By James Heintz, Political Economy Research Institute, and others. (The Institute, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, Massachusetts) 2005. 15 p.

Full Text at: www.umass.edu/peri/pdfs/DWA.pdf

["Delaware ranked first and Louisiana last in a University of Massachusetts study that tried to measure where workers are treated best, based on factors including job opportunities, job quality and workplace fairness.... The study's authors, who expect to update the rankings annually, said their findings were based on the first index to evaluate states' treatment of workers rather than their business climates. States ranking high for work environments generally enjoyed strong economic growth and low poverty rates, with the reverse true for those ranking low." Associated Press (October 26, 2005) 1.]

[Request #S60415]

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California's Entertainment Workforce Employment and Earnings, 1991-2002. By The Entertainment Economy Institute and The PMR Group, Incorporated. (The Institute, Pacific Palisades, California) December 2004. 64 p.

Full Text at: www.entertainmentecon.org/edp/File/Report/December%202004%20Reports%20121404-Final.pdf

["This report fills an important gap in the understanding of recent trends related to jobs and workforce in the industry.... The report ... facilitates access to critical information not available to other research organizations and state agencies."]

[Request #S60416]

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Promoting Opportunity: Findings from the State Workforce Policy Initiative on Employment Retention and Advancement. By Carol Clymer and others. (Public/Private Ventures, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) 2005. 47 p.

Full Text at: www.ppv.org/ppv/publications/assets/188_publication.pdf

["Although implementation of retention and advancement strategies is challenging and more research regarding effective practices needs to be completed, the results of the initiative suggest that investing in retention and advancement strategies is viable and has the potential to benefit low-income workers. Our documentation of participant, program and policy outcomes throughout the initiative provides information and ideas for state and local officials to consider should they be interested in refining welfare reform and workforce development systems to help the working poor augment their income."]

[Request #S60417]

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HUMAN SERVICES

LOW INCOME

How Do Tax Policies Affect Low Income Workers. By Kevin A. Hassett and Anne B. Moore. National Poverty Center. (The Center, Ann Arbor, Michigan) 2005. 36 p.

Full Text at: www.npc.umich.edu/publications/workingpaper05/paper16/khamfinalversion9-7.pdf

[The authors conclude that while concerns about redistribution have led to dramatic reductions in the federal income tax for low-income families with children, changes elsewhere in the code have not kept pace, and the overall tax system has not increased in progressivity as much as one would think if one focused solely on the income tax."]

[Request #S60419]

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Veterans' Employment and Training Service: Labor Actions Needed to Improve Accountability and Help States Implement Reforms to Veterans' Employment Services. By Government Accountability Office. (The Office, Washington, DC) December 2005. 62 p.

Full Text at: www.gao.gov/new.items/d06176.pdf

["Roughly 700,000 veterans have been unemployed in recent months, a figure that could swell considerably with the anticipated increase in the number of people leaving active duty. Congress passed the Jobs for Veterans Act in 2002 to improve employment and training services for veterans and to encourage employers to hire them.... GAO is recommending that the Department of Labor provide clear guidance that would integrate veterans' staff into the one-stops, ensure priority of service for veterans among all programs, and foster state use of incentives.... Finally, GAO recommended that Labor establish effective methods for enforcing federal contractor requirements."]

[Request #S60420]

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[This section links to items in Studies in the News since the last Employment, Training, Vocational Education and Welfare to Work Supplement.]

EMPLOYMENT

"Employment, Education, and Human Services." IN: Studies in the News, Issue 05-38 (October 2005) - 06-02 (January 2006).

[Includes: "Welfare reform bonuses for states;" "Undocumented workers entitled to workers' compensation;" "Few replacements for retiring public managers;" "Treatment denials for injured workers;" "Perils faced by forest workers;" "Minimum wage economics;" and others.]

[Request #S4519]

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