Delivering Skills: Apprenticeship Program Sponsorship and Transition from Training

Abstract:     
Many open-shop contractors in the U.S. construction sector sponsor training cooperatively in unilateral multi-employer apprenticeship programs. Their proponents view these coordinated efforts as an alternative to the training organized jointly by a union and signatory contactors. This paper uses a new data set to compare the performance of these program types in terms of the transition probabilities and durations of apprentices. It shows that in open-shop multiple-employer programs: (1) the completion rate is higher but still lags behind that of the union-management programs; (2) quitters leave training before substantial build-up of skills; (3) graduates complete requirements at a faster pace. While these results are disconcerting in view of the skilled labor shortage in construction, they are consistent with the open-shop sector's preference to rely extensively on semi-skilled workers.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 28

Accepted Paper Series