Abstract
The aim of this paper is to evaluate the effects of an active labor market program (ALMP) for higher educated workers in the Netherlands. The one-year program is characterized by six months of full-time IT retraining followed by a six-month internship. We estimate the effects of participating on earnings per month and working days per month. The results show significant lock-in effects during the program, lasting up to five months after program start. After this lock-in period, we find significant positive effects on earnings and working days. These positive effects remain significant until the end of the 36-month evaluation period. A conservative cost–benefit analysis based on the effects on earnings shows a return of 2.53% (95% CI 2.02–3.04%), which is low compared to the returns to education in the Netherlands of around 8%. We conclude that IT retraining has positive effects on the labor market outcomes of the participants yet relatively low returns.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 323-342 |
| Number of pages | 20 |
| Journal | De Economist |
| Volume | 170 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| Early online date | 6 Jul 2022 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Aug 2022 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:Funding was provided by European Regional Development Fund (Grant No. KVW-00147).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022, The Author(s).
Funding
Funding was provided by European Regional Development Fund (Grant No. KVW-00147).
Keywords
- Active labor market policy
- Information technology
- Internal rate of return
- Labor market out- comes
- Retraining
