Job Training

Tens of thousands lost their jobs as a result of the September 11th attacks. From the beginning, The September 11th Fund helped displaced workers. To date, the Fund provided 35,000 with cash assistance and services. While that assistance continues, the Fund is developing a long-term program to assist the unemployed, with efforts focusing on helping these individuals secure new jobs. Here are some of the background issues...

Assistance to Displaced Workers

Background

In the ripple effect of the September 11th attacks, hundreds of thousands of people throughout the United States lost jobs. An estimated 80,000 people in New York City alone lost jobs, many in the hospitality and transportation industries. Of these, as many as 35,000 worked in lower Manhattan south of Canal Street.

In the months following the attacks, the New York City area continued to lose jobs. Some jobs were eliminated entirely; others were moved out of the city. While many major corporations returned to lower Manhattan, some returned with fewer jobs, opting to protect their workforce by scattering staff in different locations. By one estimate, New York City will lose more than 57,000 jobs by 2003.1 The travel and hospitality sector, hard hit in the months immediately after the attacks, still had significantly less activity than before September 11th. In addition, many employed people saw their hours and wages drop as businesses, large and small, cut back. In this environment, the thousands who lost work compete for fewer jobs.

At the time of the attacks, the US economy was weakening. As a result, it is difficult to attribute some job losses to the attacks alone, rather than the general downturn. At the wishes of its donors and in keeping with its mandate - to help victims, families and communities directly affected by the terrorist attacks - The September 11th Fund provided assistance to those who lost work as a direct result of tragedy. Those who qualified for assistance from the Fund worked below Canal Street and lost their jobs between September 11 and January 11.

Moving Forward: Who Will Be Helped?

In developing future programs to help the tens of thousands who remain unemployed, the Fund will continue to assist displaced workers who worked south of Canal Street. In addition, other eligible groups might include:

• Workers at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, which was closed by order of the Federal Aviation Administration for several weeks after September 11th and then allowed to reopen with severe operating restrictions, which applied to no other airport. An estimated 10,000 people were put out of work temporarily by the government's decision to close the airport, and as of February 2002, the airport was still operating 45 percent below pre-September 11th levels.
  
  
• Workers formerly employed immediately north of Canal Street, whether bounded by Houston Street or 14th Street. Although this area was blocked for only a few days, access was severely disrupted and businesses in the area suffered a great deal.
  

What Kind of Assistance Should be Available?

Many of those who lost their jobs as a result of the September 11th attacks were experienced and skilled. Even in a weakened economy, they are equipped to find and secure alternatives. However, of those who lost jobs below Canal Street, approximately half are low-skilled, low-wage workers2 who are likely to have more difficulty. Many in this group are immigrants, some of them undocumented. Without special efforts, some will not make use of job services, or even know that help is available. While the Fund offered cash assistance to these workers in the first five months after the attacks, the future priority will be on helping them return to the workforce.

There are two basic kinds of employment help:

• All job seekers can benefit from job placement and development services, such as help preparing a resume; coaching on how to search and interview for a job; access to job listings; skills assessment; and help identifying available jobs. These services are typically short-term, with a goal of immediate re-employment.
  
  
• For those who lack skills and experience, job training and education services help them prepare for better, higher-paying jobs. These services typically last for at least several months and involve formal classes that may be offered by a training business (either nonprofit or for-profit), a union, or a community college.
  

Determining How to Help

Government and the private sector provide substantial support for job services, but opportunities exist to augment their activities. The September 11th Fund will use its resources to bridge and fill gaps in government and private sector services.

In terms of job development and placement, services are widely available from two sources: 1) major corporations, which provide "out-placement" as part of severance packages, and 2) government, which offers job placement as a service to the general public, and whose efforts have strengthened since September 11th. New York City established four job centers, collectively known as the Twin Towers Job Link, which include access to a comprehensive jobs listing database, assistance with resume writing, and some basic skill assessment. New Jersey has a long-standing system of job centers that offer similar help. With these combined efforts, additional support from the Fund will probably not be necessary.

Job training and education services, by contrast, are not yet available to all the displaced workers who might use them. Because most unemployed people cannot afford to be without work, they will tend to take the first available position, even if it is at a lower wage, with fewer hours or with limited long-term security. In a recession, unskilled and low-skilled workers may experience great difficulty in finding any job. Training and education can build their skills and make them more attractive to employers.

Typically, training services are provided through government-sponsored vouchers, which individuals can use to pay for job training at a provider of their choice. Yet even where strong voucher programs exist, many displaced workers do not make use of them, for three reasons. These include: lack of knowledge about available programs; barriers due to language or cultural difficulties; and pressing financial needs, which force people to take a job and forego training. For lower-skilled displaced workers, the availability of job training may be critical to their ability to find worthwhile employment in a weakened economy.

The Fund will likely provide resources to ensure that displaced workers are able to access these services. Two possible areas of support to these programs include:

Funding Organizations to Provide Advice & Outreach

To make a voucher program successful, it would help to make grants to one or more intermediary organizations to (a) help people identify the training that makes the most sense; (b) access training vouchers from the public system; and (c) connect to high-quality providers. It could also be useful to make a small number of grants to providers that can demonstrate a particular ability to reach hard-to-serve immigrant populations.

Income Support During Training

Another way the September 11th Fund could use its resources in a way that complements public programs would be to underwrite limited financial support, based on need, during the training period. This would make it possible for more people to use training vouchers. Any such program would require the use of an intermediary organization to provide procedural safeguards and oversight.

1	From Working Together to Accelerate New York's Recovery, an economic impact study by New York City Partnership, updated February 2002.
2	Safe Horizon reported, in a preliminary analysis, that the median reported annual pay of those who had applied for assistance was less than $20,000.

Safe Horizon

Local United Ways

9/11 United
Services Group

NY State Charity Database

Foundation Center

How funds are distributed

More than two million people donated

Who is eligible

Grant list and descriptions

Six month report

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