Long-term consequences of an innovative redundancy - retraining project : the Austrian Steel Foundation

In the late 1980s, privatization and downsizing of nationalized steel mills, and related firms in the metal industry, have lead to large-scale redundancy plans. A special Steel Foundation was created as part of a social plan. This foundation acted like an independent training center, where displaced workers would spend relatively long training periods, obtaining personality and orientation training, as well as formal education. The last step of the integrative program was placement assistance, as well as assistance for creating one's own business. The foundation was financed by (higher) contributions from unemployment insurance funds, by the previous firms themselves, as well as by a collectively-bargained special tax on the remaining workers in the steel firms. Moreover, the trainees themselves would have to support the foundation by giving up the interest accruing to their redundancy payments. The report combined data from Austrian social security records, and from the Employment Service, to look at participation decisions, and at post-foundation economic performance. Then, as a control group, all displaced workers were taken into consideration, using instrumental variables to solve the selection problem. Results show considerable wage gains - even for a period of five years after leaving the Foundation - as well as improved employments prospects, and, finally, a cost-benefit analysis assesses the long-term success of the Foundation.