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The WtW grants program seeks to promote self-sufficiency through employment. Accordingly, in this evaluation, various aspects of the labor-market success of WtW enrollees are key outcome measures. This chapter uses these measures to describe the success of WtW enrollees in the labor market. The reader is cautioned that the values of these measures cannot necessarily be attributed to the program. This evaluation was not based on an experimental design; consequently, it is not possible to estimate the contributions of the program itself to the observed outcomes with a level of confidence that would be appropriate for this report to Congress.
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Most WtW enrollees were employed during at least some part of the year after they entered the program. While this is encouraging, there was a notable lack of consistency in their employment — most enrollees were without jobs for at least half of the year, and few were substantially employed at the end of the year.
1. Were Enrollees Employed at All During the Year After Program Entry?
Few WtW enrollees in sites other than Baltimore County and St. Lucie County were employed when they entered the program, but most were employed at some time during the subsequent year. Thus, the study sites generally achieved the most fundamental objective of the WtW grants program, which was to move enrollees into employment. Not surprisingly, this measure of labor-market success was highest for the two sites that operated the JHU program, which was designed to serve persons who were already employed. In these sites — Baltimore County and St. Lucie County — most enrollees were employed when they entered the program, and more than 90 percent were employed at some time during the following year (Exhibit IV.1).(34) In the other nine study sites, the range of this measure is narrow, with a low value of 65 percent for Boston and Chicago and a high of 80 percent for West Virginia and Yakima.
Although most WtW enrollees in the study sites were employed at some time during the year following enrollment, substantial minorities of enrollees in the non-JHU sites failed to achieve even this modest level of labor-market success. Between one in five and one in three enrollees were not employed at all during the follow-up year in the non-JHU sites.
2. How Long Did It Take Enrollees to Find Jobs?
WtW enrollees who were not employed when they entered the program required an average of four to five months to find their first post-enrollment jobs (Exhibit IV.2).(35) The time that it took enrollees to find jobs was determined by a host of factors, including the nature of the services they received. Chapter III provided a classification of sites based on the services received by enrollees. In the two "rapid job entry" sites, Phoenix and Yakima, enrollees obtained their first jobs in an average of 3.8 and 4.3 months, respectively. The average elapsed time until the first job tended to be longer in the five "extensive pre-employment services" sites, ranging from a low of 4.3 months in Philadelphia to a high of 5.1 months in West Virginia.(36) Thus, the elapsed time until the first job tended to be lower in sites that provided services consistent with rapid job entry than in sites that provided more extensive pre-employment services.
Ft. Worth was classified in Chapter III as a site where WtW enrollees received "minimal services.". Exhibit IV.2 shows that those enrollees required an average of 5.1 months to find their first job. Only the ex-offender enrollees in Milwaukee required more time to become employed. This combination of factors suggests that the Ft. Worth enrollees had unmet needs for services.
3. For What Proportion of the Year Were Enrollees Employed?
WtW enrollees in all but the two JHU program sites were employed for an average of only between one-third and one-half of the follow-up year (Exhibit IV.3). Because the JHU program was designed to serve persons who already had jobs, it is not surprising that enrollees in the Baltimore County and St. Lucie County sites were employed for the largest proportions of the year — nearly three-quarters, on average. The much lower proportions for the other nine sites reflect the interplay among three intermediate employment outcomes: (1) the fraction of enrollees who were never employed during the year,(37) (2) the average duration until the first job for those who became employed, and (3) the rate of job loss by enrollees who were employed at enrollment or who subsequently became employed. These intermediate outcomes may be influenced by WtW service strategies, as follows:
A strategy of rapid job entry would be expected to minimize the duration until the first job (intermediate outcome #2) and perhaps also reduce the fraction of enrollees who are never employed during the year following program entry (intermediate outcome #1). However, this strategy might carry an elevated risk that enrollees will not be strongly attached to the jobs that they obtain, resulting in an elevated rate of job loss (intermediate outcome #3).(38)
A strategy of extensive pre-employment services might result in better matches of enrollees with jobs, thus reducing the risk of job loss (intermediate outcome #3).(39),(40) However, the extensive pre-employment services would likely extend the time until the first job (intermediate outcome #1) and might also increase the risk that an enrollee would remain without work for the entire year following program entry (intermediate outcome #2).
The Yakima and West Virginia study sites illustrate the trade-offs between these two service strategies with respect to employment outcomes. Yakima pursued a rapid entry strategy; only half of the WtW enrollees in that site received job readiness training, with an average duration of just 9 days. In contrast, West Virginia pursued an extensive services strategy; three-fourths of its enrollees received job readiness training for an average duration of 24 days. The enrollees in these two sites were equally likely to be employed sometime during the year following program entry (80 percent, Exhibit IV.1). However, the mean duration until the first job was longer for enrollees in West Virginia than those in Yakima: 5.1 months versus 4.3 months (Exhibit IV.2). The incidence of job loss was 58 percent in West Virginia, versus 71 percent in Yakima (Exhibit IV.8). Despite the substantial differences in two of the three intermediate employment outcomes, the mean percentage of time enrollees had a job during the year following program entry was similar in the two sites — 49 percent in Yakima and 44 percent in West Virginia.
4. Were Enrollees Employed One Year After Program Entry?
In most of the study sites, less than half of WtW enrollees were employed one year after they entered the program; however, employment rates at that time were much higher than those at the time of program entry in all but the two JHU sites (where program participants tended to be employed when they enrolled).(41) West Virginia was the only non-JHU site to achieve an end-of-year employment rate in excess of 50 percent; however, Yakima fell just short of that threshold (Exhibit IV.4). In the other seven non-JHU sites, the rate was generally about 40 percent, which is very similar to the 42 percent employment rate for former TANF recipients nationwide reported by Loprest (2003).(42) The end-of-year employment rates for WtW enrollees were much lower than the rates of employment sometime during the year (Exhibit IV.1), indicating considerable instability in employment.
Local programs funded by WtW grants were expected to be integrated with the corresponding state TANF programs. It is therefore useful to assess end-of-year employment outcomes for WtW enrollees in terms of the TANF work requirement, as specified in the 1996 PRWORA legislation, which can be paraphrased as follows:
The nonexempt adult head of a single-parent TANF case must spend at least 30 hours per week working on a job for pay or participating in work-related activities. Participation in education and training programs may account for no more than 10 of the required hours.(43)
In Exhibit IV.5, the TANF work requirement is used as a standard against which to assess employment outcomes for WtW enrollees one year after program entry, without regard for their actual TANF participation status at that time. The exhibit displays the percentage of enrollees that would have satisfied the TANF work requirement based on 30 or more hours of paid employment alone (shown by the length of the dark section of each bar), as well as the percentage that would have satisfied the requirement based on 20-29 hours of paid employment plus an assumed 1-10 hours of participation in education, training, or other work-related activities (shown by the full length of each bar, including both its dark and light sections). The following discussion focuses only on the former percentage.
The rates at which WtW enrollees would have satisfied the TANF 30-hour-per-week work requirement if they had been on TANF one year after program entry were slightly lower than their rates of employment, but the patterns of these two measures were similar across the study sites. Exhibit IV.5 shows that about two-thirds of enrollees in the JHU sites were employed at levels consistent with the TANF requirement, whereas only about one-third of enrollees in the other sites were (with the exception of West Virginia, where 43 percent of enrollees were working at least 30 hours per week). Further analysis revealed that the absence of any employment, rather than insufficient hours of work by those who were employed, accounted for large majorities of the WtW enrollees in each of the study sites who were not working at levels consistent with the TANF 30-hour standard.(44)
The end-of-year employment results presented in this section might be regarded as disappointing by many readers. However, as programs funded by the WtW grants were required (by Public Law 105-33) to serve hard-to-employ adults who were either on assistance or were at risk of long-term welfare dependency, the results could be interpreted alternatively as representing a notable degree of success in a challenging program environment.
5. Why Were Some Enrollees Not Employed One Year After Program Entry?
Among the WtW enrollees who were not employed one year after program entry, the most commonly cited reason for lack of employment was difficulty finding a job (Appendix Exhibit B.9). This was true for nearly half of the Milwaukee enrollees who were not employed and between one-tenth and one-third of their counterparts in the other study sites. A number of factors may have been underlying this reported difficulty, such as a weak local labor market, a bad match of the enrollee's skills with the requirements of the available jobs, and personal characteristics that present a challenge to employment. Given the additional liabilities that ex-offenders bring to the labor market, it is not surprising that WtW enrollees in Milwaukee were most likely to attribute their lack of employment to difficulty in finding a job.
The enrollee's poor health or work-limiting disability was the second most frequently cited reason for lack of employment. Nearly one in four enrollees in West Virginia gave this explanation for their lack of a job one year after enrollment, as did about one in five enrollees in Baltimore County, Ft. Worth, Nashville, and Phoenix (Appendix Exhibit B.9). These high rates may have been due to higher incidences of poor health or disabilities in these sites and/or to a mix of available jobs that required higher levels of physical functioning.(45)For example, relatively large proportions of enrollees age 40 or older in Baltimore County (20 percent) and West Virginia (17 percent) may have made those groups more susceptible to health problems and disabilities.
Some enrollees who were not employed one year after entering WtW attributed their lack of a job to factors other than those just noted. These percentages were generally low, with some notable exceptions:
Nashville Works/Pathways. Sixteen percent of jobless enrollees in this program cited participation in education or training programs as their principal reason for not being employed. This is consistent with two characteristics of the Nashville program. First, an unusually large proportion of enrollees in that program (one in five) were in high school at the time of enrollment (Exhibit II.2). Second, the 44 percent rate of participation by Nashville enrollees in education and training programs following enrollment is the second highest of the sites studied (Exhibit III.4).
West Virginia-HRDF. Fifteen percent of enrollees in this program who were not employed a year after enrollment cited transportation problems as the principal reason. West Virginia's TANF recipients often reside in rural areas, but the state's jobs are concentrated in urban centers, making it difficult for many TANF recipients to get to jobs. The HRDF program included specific features to address this problem, but the survey evidence suggests that gaps in access to transportation remained.
Milwaukee-NOW. Ten percent of ex-offenders who enrolled in this program and were jobless a year later cited legal problems as the principal reason for not being employed, indicating that a criminal record can be a substantial barrier to employment.
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Welfare policymakers are concerned not only that able-bodied TANF recipients and other at-risk adults become employed, but also that they eventually obtain jobs that allow them to achieve substantial self-sufficiency. Expectations for initial jobs may be more modest, based on an assumption of subsequent advancement to better jobs. This section describes the characteristics of the principal job held by WtW enrollees who were employed one year after program entry. Section C presents findings on job advancement.
1. What Kinds of Jobs Did Enrollees Obtain?
WtW enrollees who were employed one year after program entry were most frequently in office and administrative support or sales occupations. Office and administrative support was the most common occupational category for enrollees in all but the Milwaukee and West Virginia sites, the latter being the most rural of the 11 study sites (Appendix Exhibit B.10). Nearly half of employed enrollees in Phoenix were in this occupational group, as were about a fourth in many of the other sites. Wholesale and retail sales occupations were also common in most sites, typically accounting for 10 to 20 percent of employed enrollees. The predominantly male enrollees in Milwaukee were concentrated in occupations, such as production and transportation, that were distinctly different from those favored by the mostly female enrollees in the other study sites.
About half or more of the principal jobs held by employed enrollees in 10 of the study sites were in service industries — primarily business, health, and social services (Appendix Exhibit B.11). Reflecting differences between the sexes, Milwaukee was the exceptional site, wherein jobs in manufacturing and transportation/utilities were held by nearly a third of the employed enrollees, as compared with about a tenth of enrollees most of in the other sites. The industries in which WtW enrollees worked likely reflect both the industrial base of the local economies and the job placement strategies of the WtW programs. For example, in Boston — a major market for the provision of health care, and a site in which the WtW program partnered with several local health care providers to train and hire WtW enrollees — the principal jobs held by 29 percent of employed enrollees were in the health services industry.
2. How Many Hours Per Week Did Enrollees Work?
WtW enrollees who were employed one year after program entry typically put in a full workweek on their primary job. The top panel of Exhibit IV.6 shows that the mean hours of work per week on the principal job ranged from 32 to 37 across the 11 study sites. In no site did more than 10 percent of employed enrollees work fewer than 20 hours per week on their principal job (Appendix Exhibit B.12). This finding further substantiates our earlier observation that the absence of any employment, rather than inadequate hours of work by those who were employed, accounted for almost all of the enrollees who were not working at levels consistent with the TANF 30-hour standard.
3. How Well Were Enrollees Compensated for Their Labor?
The elements of employment compensation considered in this evaluation are the hourly wage rate and fringe benefits, with a focus on health insurance, paid sick leave, and pensions.(46) As in the preceding two sections, the findings on compensation are based on the principal job held by an employed WtW enrollee one year after program entry.
a. What Was Their Hourly Rate of Pay?
WtW enrollees in eight of the study sites had a mean wage rate on their primary job of between approximately $7 and $8 per hour (Exhibit IV.6, bottom panel). West Virginia, Baltimore County, and Boston were the exceptions to this pattern. Although enrollees in West Virginia had more favorable employment outcomes than those in many of the other study sites, their mean hourly wage rate ($5.75) was notably low. In contrast, the mean wage rates for WtW enrollees in Baltimore County ($9.08) and Boston ($9.82) were well above those for enrollees in the other sites.
If the employed WtW enrollees had been consistently working 40 hours per week for an entire month at the hourly wage on their primary job and had no income from government programs, but did have their actual income from other sources (such as the earnings of other household members), then their households would have experienced poverty rates ranging from a low of 20 percent in Baltimore County and Boston to a high of 71 percent in West Virginia.(47) In nine of the sites, the hourly wage received by WtW enrollees on their primary job was such that more than one-third of them would have been living in poverty even if they had been working full time and receiving no government assistance. This finding is based on a measure of income that does not include the earned-income tax credit (EITC).
b. What Fringe Benefits Were Available to Them?
Overall, fringe benefits were available to only modest proportions of WtW enrollees on their principal job one year after entering the program (Exhibit IV.7). Consequently, the self-sufficiency of most enrollees, to the extent that they achieved it, was precarious — contingent on remaining healthy and continuing to work.
Paid sick leave was the most common, or tied for the most common, of three key fringe benefits in every study site, followed by a pension plan. Health insurance was the least common. Rates of availability of these three benefits ranged across the study sites as follows:(48)
Paid Sick Leave. The availability of paid sick leave ranged from a low of 25 percent in West Virginia to a high of 63 percent in Baltimore County.
Pension Plan. The availability of a pension plan ranged from a low of 24 percent in Chicago, West Virginia, and Yakima to a high of 54 percent in Boston.
In general, fringe benefits were available to employed enrollees at relatively low or high rates in the same study sites where wage rates were respectively relatively low or high. For example, in West Virginia, employed enrollees had the lowest mean wage rate and the lowest rates of availability of paid sick leave and a pension plan. And in Boston, where the mean wage rate was highest among the study sites, these two fringe benefits were available to relatively large proportions of employed enrollees.(49)
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Job turnover is often viewed as a barrier to the long-term success of at-risk adults in the labor market. Consequently, some WtW programs, most notably those following the JHU model, include services designed to reduce the rates at which enrollees who have achieved employment leave their jobs. However, in the broader population, changing jobs is often viewed as a career-enhancing step. This section documents job exit rates among WtW enrollees and presents evidence that job changes by these individuals sometimes resulted in additional fringe benefits.
1. Did Employed Enrollees Commonly Leave Their Jobs?
It was not at all unusual for WtW enrollees who had achieved employment to leave their jobs. Exhibit IV.8 shows that in all but two study sites, more than half of enrollees who were employed on or following program entry left their initial job during the follow-up year. The rate of exit from the initial job was highest — at least 70 percent — in Philadelphia, Phoenix, and Yakima. It was lowest in Baltimore County and St. Lucie County, where the JHU program provided services designed to reduce job loss, and in Boston, where employer-sponsored programs fostered strong employee-employer bonds.
Enrollees who did leave their initial job tended to obtain another, rather than remain out of work. Nashville typified this pattern, with 57 percent of enrollees who left their initial job able to obtain another (Appendix Exhibit B.6). Five sites achieved higher reemployment rates — among them Yakima and West Virginia, where about two-thirds of enrollees who departed from their initial job moved to a new job. The mean number of jobs held by ever-employed individuals during the year following enrollment in WtW ranged from a low of 1.4 jobs in Boston and Chicago to a high of 1.8 jobs in Yakima (Appendix Exhibit B.6).(50)
The most common reason for departure from the initial job in most of the study sites was a voluntary quit (Exhibit IV.9). But in Philadelphia and Yakima half of enrollees lost their jobs because the work period had ended; this is not surprising, given that the design of the Philadelphia TWC program entailed placing WtW enrollees in six-month transitional jobs, and seasonal jobs are prevalent in Yakima's agricultural-based economy.(51)Dismissal by the employer for cause (firing) accounted for only 7 to 13 percent of departures from the initial job in sites other than the JHU sites, where it accounted for 17 percent of departures in Baltimore County and 18 percent in St. Lucie County.
2. Did Job Changers Advance to Better Jobs?
WtW enrollees who left the first job they held on or following program entry for another job often received additional fringe benefits on the new job. They less frequently received a higher wage or worked longer hours. The overall pattern of these findings suggests that job turnover can be conducive to job advancement by at-risk adults.(52)
In nearly half of the 11 study sites, WtW enrollees who left their initial post-enrollment job received more fringe benefits on the most recent job they held during the year following program entry. Appendix Exhibit B.14 shows that job changers in Chicago, Ft. Worth, Philadelphia, West Virginia, and Yakima were significantly more likely to have an additional fringe benefit available to them on their most recent job than on their initial job post-enrollment in WtW. In no site did job changers experience a significant reduction in the availability of any one of the six fringe benefits considered in this evaluation.(53) Exhibit IV.10 displays the findings pertaining to participation in an employer's health insurance plan on the initial and most recent jobs.(54)
In general, job changes did not result in a higher wage or more work hours; however, some study sites did deviate from this pattern. Exhibit IV.11 shows that job changers experienced statistically significant increases in weekly hours of work only in Nashville and Philadelphia, and in the hourly wage only in Philadelphia, West Virginia, and Yakima.
These findings show that job turnover, rather than impeding enrollees' labor-market success, often resulted in a job that provided more fringe benefits. It less often led to a job that provided longer hours or higher wages. Fringe benefit availability, work hours, and wages were almost never lower on the new job. This does not mean that all job turnover is conducive to positive outcomes. Nor does it mean that turnover is the only or the most efficient route to a better job; enrollees who remained on the initial job may have experienced growth in hours, wages, and benefits, but the available data cannot support an investigation of whether this occurred.(55)
Exhibit IV.1
Percentage of WtW Enrollees Who Were Employed Sometime During the Year after
Program Entry
Exhibit IV.2
Mean Number of Months until WtW Enrollees' First Job after Program Entry
Exhibit IV.3
Mean Percentage of Time with a Job by WtW Enrollees During the Year After
Program Entry
Exhibit IV.4
Employment Status of WtW Enrollees at the Time of Program Entry and One Year
Later
Exhibit IV.5
Hours of Work by WtW Enrollees on All Jobs Held One Year after Program
Entry,
Assessed Relative to the Tanf Work Requirement
Exhibit IV.6
Hours of Work and Wage Rate on the Principal Job Held by
WtW Enrollees One Year after Program Entry
Exhibit IV.7
Percentages of WtW Enrollees with Fringe Benefits on the Principal Job
Held One Year after Program Entry
Exhibit IV.8
Rate of Departure by WtW Enrollees from the Initial Job Held after Program
Entry
Exhibit IV.9
Circumstances of Departure by WtW Enrollees from the Initial Job Held After
Program Entry
Exhibit IV.10
Job Advancement During the Year after Program Entry: Percentage of Employed
Enrollees
Who Participated in Employer's Health Insurance Plan
Exhibit IV.11
Job Advancement During the Year after Program Entry
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34. The JHU model targeted individuals who were already employed. However, some enrollees were not yet working or had been working but had recently lost their jobs at the time of program entry. In these relatively unusual cases, program staff began serving the enrollees prior to their employment and the services included assistance in finding jobs.
35. The Milwaukee site was an exception to this pattern. There, the NOW program served an especially hard-to-employ population of noncustodial parents who had been incarcerated or were on probation or parole when they enrolled in WtW. The Milwaukee enrollees who were not employed at program entry required nearly six months, on average, to obtain their first jobs.
36. Especially in the extensive pre-employment services sites, the measured duration until the first job may have been distorted by the difficulty that some enrollees had in distinguishing between subsidized employment (a common service in these sites) and unsubsidized employment.
37. If enrollees who were never employed during the follow-up year are excluded from the analysis, Exhibit IV.3 shows that the average proportion of the year that the remaining enrollees were employed is about 10 to 20 percentage points higher than for all enrollees in the non-JHU sites.
38. The incidence of job loss during the year following enrollment was, in fact, relatively high in the two "rapid job entry" sites — 70 percent in Phoenix and 71 percent in Yakima (Exhibit IV.8).
39. Hamilton (2002) reports a finding from the National Evaluation of Welfare-to-Work Strategies that, among programs with a strong focus on employment, those that emphasize job search while also providing a menu of short-term pre-employment services are more effective than those that offer primarily job search. An important dimension of the enhanced effectiveness of the mixed approach is an increase in the stability of employment.
40. The incidence of job loss during the follow-up year was moderate in four of the five "extensive pre-employment services" sites — approximately 50 to 60 percent in Boston, Chicago, Nashville, and West Virginia. In contrast, the incidence of job loss was high, 74 percent, in Philadelphia. The latter may have been due in part to a program design that entailed placing enrollees in transitional subsidized jobs as a precursor to paid employment.
41. We caution the reader not to interpret the differences in employment rates over the year following WtW enrollment (Exhibit IV.4) as impacts of the local programs. While the programs probably contributed to these positive differences, other factors were no doubt at work. One of those factors is the well-documented tendency for individuals to enter employment and training programs shortly after experiencing a dip in their employment. Even in the absence of the programs, many of these individuals could have had better employment outcomes over the succeeding months as a consequence of their own efforts and better luck.
42. Loprest (2003) reports a 42 percent employment rate among adults who had left TANF during the two years prior to the 2002 Survey of America's Families. Some of these individuals had returned to TANF by the time of the survey interview.
43. PL 104-193, section 407, subsections (c) and (d). The 30-hour requirement became effective in fiscal year 2000.
44. The figures presented in Appendix Exhibit B.8 can be transformed (by dividing the sum of the percentages in rows two and three by the sum of the percentages in rows one through three) to obtain the proportion of enrollees who were not satisfying the TANF 30-hour work requirement because they were employed but their hours of work were insufficient. This proportion was 26 percent in St. Lucie County and was lower in all of the other study sites. For example, it was just 5 percent in Phoenix.
45. In four of these five sites (West Virginia, Baltimore County, Ft. Worth, and Nashville), WtW enrollees had relatively high rates of work-limiting health problems at the time of enrollment (Exhibit II.2).
46. This evaluation also examined the availability of dental insurance, paid holidays, and paid vacation leave. Appendix Exhibit B.12 presents findings for all of the six types of benefits that were examined.
47. Household poverty rates for employed enrollees in all of the study sites were simulated under the assumptions of 40 hours of work per week and 4.3 weeks per month at the actual wage rate on the primary job, no income from government programs (including the EITC), and whatever other income their households actually received in the month prior to the month of the survey interview. The simulated poverty rates are as follows (in percentages): Baltimore County 20, Boston 20, Chicago 60, Ft. Worth 44, Milwaukee 37, Nashville 42, Philadelphia 64, Phoenix 35, St. Lucie County 42, West Virginia 71, and Yakima 40. Alternatively, if the measure of income during the month prior to the month of the survey interview is assumed to include the enrollee's actual earnings during that month, no income from government programs, and whatever other income the household actually received, then the simulated poverty rates are higher, often substantially so: Baltimore County 42, Boston 58, Chicago 82, Ft. Worth 65, Milwaukee 59, Nashville 70, Philadelphia 82, Phoenix 76, St. Lucie County 63, West Virginia 87, and Yakima 61. An important factor contributing to the differences between these two sets of poverty rates is the lack of consistent full-time work by employed WtW enrollees over an entire month.
48. The definition of availability of a benefit varies depending on the type of benefit. Availability of health insurance refers to active participation in an employer's health insurance plan. Availability of paid sick leave and a pension refers to the potential for the enrollee to participate in these plans one year after enrolling in WtW (i.e., at the time of the interview), whether or not the enrollee actually participated in or received benefits from the plans.
49. Two study sites present exceptions to the positive relationship between wages and fringe benefits. In St. Lucie County, employed enrollees had relatively low wages but relatively high rates of availability of fringe benefits. Many of these enrollees were already employed when they entered the WtW program, thus affording them the opportunity to accrue greater tenure on their jobs, and perhaps satisfy the tenure requirements that many firms impose for access to fringe benefits. The opposite pattern prevailed in Yakima, where wages were high and the availability of fringe benefits was low. We can only speculate that this reflected the local economy and the types of jobs available and/or the job-placement strategy pursued by the Yakima WtW program.
50. The measure of jobs held during the year following enrollment in WtW includes all jobs without regard for the degree of temporal overlap in the jobs.
51. The ending of a work period encompasses three similar reasons for departure from a job: (1) a layoff, (2) the ending of a work period, and (3) the ending of a period of self-employment.
52. The findings on job advancement are based on comparisons between the most recent job held during the year after enrolling in WtW and the initial job for individuals who changed jobs during that time.
53. In a few of the study sites, the estimated rates of availability of some fringe benefits are lower on the most recent job than on the first job; however, none of the difference in these estimated rates are statistically significant.
54. The improvement in fringe benefits (and wages) may be inflated in Philadelphia and possibly other study sites as well by the fact that the local WtW program placed large proportions of enrollees in an initial job that was temporary and subsidized. Thus, by design, the initial job typically offered few or no benefits and paid a low wage.
55. The 12-month follow-up survey gathered data on job characteristics at one point in time for each employer. Consequently, the data cannot support an analysis of job progression while an enrollee remained with an employer.
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