Living with the Neighbors: Demand-Driven Youth Training Programs: Experimental Evidence from Mongolia

María Laura Alzúa, Soyolmaa Batbekh, Altantsetseg Batchuluun, Bayarmaa Dalkhjavd and Jose Galdo
Additional contact information
Bayarmaa Dalkhjavd: School of Economic Studies- National university of Mongolia

CEDLAS, Working Papers from CEDLAS, Universidad Nacional de La Plata

Abstract: Because of its high incidence and potential threat to social cohesion, youth unemployment is a global concern. This study uses a randomized controlled trial to analyze the effectiveness of a demand-driven vocational training program for disadvantaged youth in Mongolia. Mongolia, a transitional country whose economic structure shifted from a communist, centrally planned economy to a free-market economy over a relatively short period, offers a new setting in which to test the effectiveness of standard active labor market policies. This study reports positive and statistically significant short-term effects of vocational training on monthly earnings, skills matching, and self-employment. Substantial heterogeneity emerges as relatively older, richer, and better-educated individuals drive these positive effects. A second intervention that randomly assigns participants to receive repetitive weekly newsletters with information on market returns to vocational training shows positive impacts on the length of exposure to and successful completion of the program. These positive effects, however, are only observed at the intensive margin and do not lead to higher employment or earnings outcomes.

JEL-codes: C93 J08 J18 J24 J38 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 42 pages
Date: 2019-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp and nep-tra
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.cedlas.econo.unlp.edu.ar/wp/wp-content/uploads/doc_cedlas249.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:dls:wpaper:0249

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEDLAS, Working Papers from CEDLAS, Universidad Nacional de La Plata Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Ana Pacheco ().