Background: Today, America's workforce is undergoing an unprecedented series of changes. While technology is rapidly reshaping the face of our economy, a large segment of America's population, the Baby Boom Generation, is aging as business struggles to compete in an increasingly global market. Simultaneous advances in technology and changes in demography are having an impact that will continue reshaping our economy well into the 21st century. Many people are familiar with facts about technology, computers and downsizing. However, many do not know that the number of workers age 45 and over will have increased by nearly 17 million between 1994 and 2005. To meet the challenges that these impacts suggest, the Employment and Training Administration (ETA) commissioned the Radcliffe Public Policy Institute to conduct a series of focus groups on issues related to the training of older workers. Over the course of a year, several focus groups were convened. The first round of focus groups was composed of workers age 45 and over from a variety of workplaces. Another round of two additional groups, one composed of professional trainers and another of supervisors and human resource professionals, approached the issue from a different perspective. With the intent of obtaining information on workforce issues that would be useful to employers, policy makers, trainers, Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) and SCSEP administrators, the focus groups discussed several questions regarding attitudes towards the training of older workers. Although the focus group participants were generally more well off financially than SCSEP enrollees, they voiced concern about many of the same practices and perceptions of employers commonly experienced by older workers across-the-board. To assist older workers to have more positive workplace experiences, you should be aware of the employer attitudes and practices often experienced by mature workers in today' workplace. The report concludes with this caveat: "As we close out the last decade of this century and look toward the next, it is clear that neither employers nor employees can afford to sit by as the skills of the workforce become obsolete." Actions Required: SCSEP sponsors should: a. Undertake efforts to disseminate information about mature workers revealed by the study; b. Initiate dialogues with employers to educate them about the findings of the study; c. Promote efforts to educate employers about the benefits of hiring, retraining and retaining mature workers; d. Facilitate and promote continued participation by mature workers in the workforce - e.g. through job fairs, mature worker luncheons, news releases and radio and television public service announcements emphasizing the benefits of hiring, training or retraining, and retaining mature workers; and e. Coordinate with State Employment Security Agencies, JTPA State Liaisons, and Service Delivery Areas, the Governor's office and other SCSEP sponsors to further foster community efforts to hire, train and promote mature workers at the State and community levels.

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Background: RAL 2-87, issued May 26, 1987, disseminated a package containing UI Tax Rates by Industry for 1975-1985. These data were prepared by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) from the ES202 Employment, Wages, and Contributions report. Each year, BLS has prepared annual updates of this information as it has become available. The attached tables update the series through 1995.

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Background: Legislation enacted by Congress has increased requirements for full and complete reporting of national program performance for public information and accountability purposes. These laws include the Chief Financial Officers Act of 1990 and the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) of 1993. GPRA requires all federal agencies to develop and submit to Congress both a 5-year strategic plan and a Fiscal Year 1998 annual plan, with major emphases on measuring and reporting program outcomes and impacts. The Employment and Training Administration's (ETA) internal assessment of its capability to respond to these increased mandates has shown we need to do a better job of ensuring that recipients comply with existing reporting schedules. Recent experience also has illustrated the ongoing need for ETA to monitor and ensure the quality of financial and program data reported to it by recipients. Data Quality: ETA, in collaboration with the Department's Office of Inspector General, has developed a Data Quality Review Guide with which Regional Offices are conducting State reviews of data quality on a multi-year cycle. Error, edit, outlier, and data quality reports from the SPIR database contractor also help States and Regional Offices monitor the quality of SPIR data submissions. Reporting Schedule: The attached is a reporting schedule for your use in monitoring your own response to the existing reporting time lines as currently established. Reporting deadlines are, of course, subject to change in response to future developments. A major change in JTPA reporting occurred with Program Year 1992, when for the first time records for each individual terminee were required for the new SPIR system. Each successive year has shown improvements in most States' ability to work with the SPIR database contractor and to submit timely and accurate SPIR files with fewer fatal errors and fewer iterations. During those years, however, the reporting deadline was not rigorously enforced in order to provide a window of time for States to edit their SPIR data and refine their data submission procedures. Final Cutoff Date for SPIR Reporting: Due to Congress' heightened requirements for program accountability reporting, and because SPIR is now fully operational after several years of phase-in, ETA will now require firm adherence to current SPIR reporting deadlines. August 15, 1997, is the due date for initial PY 1996 SPIR submissions. ETA will now firmly observe December 1, 1997, as the final cutoff date for States' submission of PY 1996 SPIR data revisions. ETA's SPIR database contractor has been instructed not to accept further submissions after that date. ETA's public information and analysis of JTPA performance will be based on data received by December 1. Submissions received after that date will not be used for purposes of analyzing JTPA performance, testimony, public discussion and dissemination of performance data and findings. Missing and incomplete data will be identified appropriately, such as in footnotes.

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Background: During the last week in June 1997, the IRS issued Certificates of Expected Separation to 1,063 individual workers in 59 local areas. This certificate specifies a Reduction-in-Force to be implemented around November 1, 1997, which is expected to result in the termination of employment of the individuals receiving the certificate. A copy of the Certificate of Expected Separation which was issued is included as Attachment A to this TEIN. In the May 26, 1992 Federal Register, the United States Office of Personnel Management (OPM) issued a revised rule creating the Certificate of Expected Separation as a notice to a federal worker of probable termination of employment through reduction- in-force procedures. The certificate could be issued up to six months prior to the effective date of the reduction-in-force. On June 22, 1992, the Department of Labor issued Training and Employment Guidance Letter (TEGL) No. 10-91, establishing the policy that any worker, who is otherwise eligible for participation in a JTPA Title III program, who receives a Certificate of Expected Separation pursuant to the rules defined by OPM in the Federal Register notice, shall be deemed to have met the JTPA Title III eligibility criterion at Section 301 as receiving a notice of termination. The IRS, in partnership with the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), has sponsored and continues to sponsor an outplacement program for its workers through a contract with the outplacement services firm, Drake Beam Morin (DBM). Attachment B includes a description of the services covered under this contract. Given that the services do not include testing or retraining, and the services are not available to workers after they are terminated, the IRS is encouraging workers receiving the Certificate of Expected Separation to seek and use services available through the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA). Information on Location of Expected Layoffs: Attachment C provides information on the location and number of workers at each who received a Certificate of Expected Separation. Workers in all locations except the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area received the certificate on June 23; those in the DC metropolitan area received it on June 27. Action: State-level officials should make all affected substate areas aware of the action which has been taken by the IRS and of the acceptability of the Certificate of Expected Separation as a notice of termination for Title III eligibility determination purposes. States and substate grantees should coordinate with the IRS Outplacement Centers and/or local offices of Drake Beam Morin in planning and implementing reemployment services for the affected workers, and, as appropriate, initiating Rapid Response activities. A list of the IRS Outplacement Centers is included as Attachment D.

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