Economic Adjustment Assistance: Experts’ Proposed Reform Options to Better Serve Workers Experiencing Economic Disruption
3 min readWhat GAO Found
U.S. workers have faced considerable changes in how they work and in the skills they need because of economic changes created by emerging technologies, disruptive business models, and other economic forces. Federal economic adjustment assistance (EAA) programs were established, in part, to help workers adjust to these economic disruptions. Consistent with GAO’s prior work on EAA programs, experts in GAO’s roundtable identified a range of challenges to using EAA programs to effectively respond to economic disruptions workers might experience.
In light of these challenges, experts identified reform actions that could better serve workers (see table). The actions fell into six interrelated reform areas.
Examples of Potential Reform Actions That Could Better Serve Workers Who Experience Economic Disruption, as Identified by Experts in GAO’s Roundtable
Reform area |
Examples of potential reform actions identified by experts |
Proactive efforts to address disruption |
|
Access to Economic Adjustment Assistance (EAA) programs |
|
Worker training |
|
Income and other supports |
|
EAA service delivery |
|
Structure of the EAA system |
|
Source: GAO analysis of expert statements. | GAO-21-324
Note: These potential reform actions are not listed in any specific rank or order and their inclusion in this report should not be interpreted as GAO endorsing any of them. GAO did not assess how effective the potential reform actions may be or the extent to which program design modifications, legal changes, and federal financial support would be needed to implement any given reform action or combination of reform actions.
Why GAO Did This Study
Various economic disruptions, such as policy changes that affect global trade or the defense or energy industries and shifts in immigration, globalization, or automation, can lead to widespread job loss among workers within an entire region, industry, or occupation. GAO was asked about options for reforming the current policies and programs for helping workers weather economic disruption.
This report describes a range of options, identified by experts, to reform the current policies and programs for helping workers weather economic disruption. With the assistance of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, GAO convened a 2-day, virtual roundtable in August 2020 with 12 experts, selected to represent a broad spectrum of views and expertise and a variety of professional and academic fields. They included academic researchers, program evaluators, labor economists, former federal agency officials, and state and local practitioners. GAO also reviewed relevant federal laws, prior GAO reports, and other research.
For more information, contact Cindy S. Brown Barnes at (202) 512-7215 or brownbarnesc@gao.gov.