Narrative: II. b.

State Strategic Vision and Goals

Under the leadership of the Governor and Secretary for the Labor and Workforce Development Agency, California’s vision for the future of workforce development is centered on the establishment and growth of a workforce system that promotes equity, job quality, and environmental sustainability for all Californians.

California is committed to developing a workforce system that enables economic growth and shared prosperity for employers and employees, especially those with barriers to employment, by investing in industry partnerships, job quality, and meaningful skills attainment.

One area in which CWDB pursues these aims is through its High Road Training Partnerships. High Road is defined in statute as “a set of economic and workforce strategies to achieve economic growth, economic equity, shared prosperity, and a clean environment.  In practice, High Road policy builds on areas where interest of employers (in trained, and productive workers), workers and jobseekers (in good quality and accessible jobs), and environmental protection (for a sustainable future for all) overlap, to create pathways to high-quality jobs while raising the profile of existing ones.

Since the previous planning cycle, CWDB has reflected on the practical implementation of High Road Training Partnerships and high road principles, arriving at four distinct “characteristics” for these programs. These strategies inform all CWDB’s workforce efforts: (1) Lift All Workers to the High Road, (2) Professionalize Precarious Work, (3) Democratize Access to High-Quality Middle Skill Jobs, and (4) Participatorily Plan the Low-Carbon Economy.

These four interventions, which are detailed in the discussion that follows, closely mirror the Four Pillars of the DOL-ETA’s 2030 Vision[1] as the table below summarizes:

Four Pillars & Four Interventions:

The Continued Need for a High Road Workforce Agenda: Labor Market Demand, Skill Profile, Quality Profile, Accessibility Profile

At the time of drafting, the U.S. unemployment rate in the most recent quarter was 3.8 percent.[2] A useful lesson can be gleaned by comparing this rate with the much higher rates of poverty (12.4 percent nationally[3]); of healthcare uninsurance (8 percent[4]); and particularly of self-reported financial insecurity (over 50 percent of respondents in a survey by the U.S. Census Bureau[5]).

Within California, while the current unemployment rate is less than 5 percent,[6] research by the Public Policy Institute of California found that more than one-quarter of state residents were at or near poverty (2021).[7] The same research also found that 64.2 percent of poor Californians lived in families with at least one working adult, with 34.7 percent of those in poverty having at least one member reported working full-time for the entire year.[8] A report by the nonpartisan research organization the California Budget and Policy Center estimated that about 2.1 million California households were facing housing hardship in the first months of 2022, meaning people were already late on rent or mortgage payments and/or had low confidence in their ability to make their next payment.[9]

A clear implication is that, while jobs exist, too many Californians are unable to attain a standard of living that lifts them out of financial insecurity.

At the same time, major growth industries, such as healthcare, experience significant demand for workers.

What are the policy barriers to helping unemployed and underemployed workers into high-quality and in-demand jobs?

CWDB’s High Road approach seeks to respond to the needs of jobseekers and industry, in a manner that promotes access to employment in already-good jobs and raises the profile of jobs in those burgeoning in-demand sectors which will form the backbone of the state’s economy.

Labor market projections from the Employment Development Department’s Labor Market Information Division (LMID), coupled with occupational pay and demographics, provide the information needed to address gaps in the talent pipeline of industry while addressing goals of equity, job quality, and climate sustainability in the workforce. The text below highlights several in-demand sectors and occupations and the issues facing them, using a combination of LMID and Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data and other sources.

The ten sectors projected to employ the largest numbers of Californians by 2030 are dominated by services, especially by healthcare, and also include Professional and Business Services, Leisure and Hospitality, Accommodation and Food Services, Retail Trade, Transportation and Warehousing, as well as Construction and the sector that contains janitorial and security work.[10] At the same time, employment in other areas—particularly in fossil fuel sectors­—will decline; while these jobs are being replaced by new activities in the low-carbon economy, details are difficult to anticipate.

Projections hold several implications for CWDB’s High Road workforce development approach. Specifically, workforce development must address demand in service fields in a way that ensures equitable mobility for workers; it must find ways to meet continuing demand in good-quality middle-skill construction jobs in a manner that reflects the diversity of the state; and it must work creatively to foster training for jobs in new sectors.

Below discusses key employment sectors, along with their key issues pertaining to demand, training, and equity and job quality issues.

Healthcare--challenge of achieving equitable access to high-quality jobs while meeting demand.

The DOL ETA has recently called out the need to plan for workforce training in the care economy and in nursing, specifically, as part of its “ETA 2030” vision.[11] This inclusion reflects awareness of both the economic demand for care workers, and the access and quality issues that make it an important focus for workforce development.

In California, healthcare is projected to be the top-employment sector in the state by 2030,[12] and top-growth 25 growth occupations in the state include multiple health occupations. Home Health Aides and Personal Care Aides represent the largest growth occupation in ten-year projections, anticipated to add jobs by 2030. Other in-demand jobs in healthcare include high-paying occupations like Nurse Practitioner, which is among the fastest-growing occupations in the state, projected to grow by 56 percent by 2030.[13]

Demand in some areas of the state is even higher. Workers in primary care, primary prevention, behavioral health, and aging-related services are disproportionately undersupplied across the state. Heavily underserved areas (termed Health Professional Shortage Areas or HPSAs) are 70 percent Latino, African American, and Native American.[14] In behavioral health, some areas (Inland Empire and the San Joaquin Valley) have low provider-to-population ratios while other areas (the Bay Area) employ over three times more psychiatrists than those two regions on a population basis.[15]Current worker retirements have led to a looming shortage of experienced nurses and other health professionals.

Healthcare is a large field and encompasses a range of occupations, from jobs that pay just above the minimum wage to those that offer high pay and benefits.

Unfortunately, there is often little mobility between jobs at the lower end of the pay scale (home health, CNA) and the upper end (nurse, doctor). Low pay contributes to low retention rates, as workers may leave to seek similar pay in lower-stress service jobs.[16]  In California, Nursing Assistants make a median hourly wage of $20.12 while the median hourly wage for home health and personal care aides is only $15.63, or barely above the state minimum.[17]

Many of the lower-paid healthcare jobs exact emotional and physical demands (e.g., lifting patients) on workers. In one study surveying Medicare certified Home care aides in Chicago, interviewees described common stressors including workplace abuse, lack of training, and lack of information in the care environment. When surveyed for health indicators, direct care workers in Chicago reported elevated rates of stress-related health conditions such as hypertension, asthma, and arthritis. Smoking habits of direct care workers were double those of the average American, and mental health issues were a common theme among interviewed direct care workers.[18] 

In contrast, other in-demand healthcare jobs—such as Nurse Practitioners, are projected to experience 12 percent employment growth by 2024 and by 55 percent employment growth by 2030—are high-paying (NPs in California make a median hourly wage of $74.66) and offer better benefits, and job security, while imposing fewer physical demands on workers.

Yet, representation of people of color and immigrants in these higher-quality, higher-paid health jobs is lower than at the low end of the pay and quality scale, suggesting significant blocked mobility from entry-level occupations. National data shows that 9.9 percent of NPs are Black, 6.7 percent Latinx, and 6.25 are Asian. By contrast, 36.0 percent of nursing assistants are Black, 15.3 percent are Latinx, and 5.6 percent are Asian; and 32.5 percent of home health aides are Black, 28.9 percent are Latinx, and 11.1 percent are Asian.[19]

As research continually finds benefits to patients from racial/ethnic concordance among providers and patients,[20] increasing access for Latinos, African Americans, and Native Americans to jobs as nurses and physicians will be a major priority as well for quality of care.[21]

The state’s Workforce for a Healthy California initiative[22] is a comprehensive and interagency investment in expanding and diversifying California’s health and human services workforce across behavioral health, primary and specialty care, nursing, allied health, and direct care professions.

Roles supported by the investment include nurses, social workers, caregivers, community health worker/promotor(a)s/representatives (CHW/P/R), emergency medical technicians, and others. Workforce for a Healthy California will also support individuals interested in transitioning to health careers, including English Language Learners and underserved populations.

Workforce for a Healthy California complements other major initiatives, including the Children and Youth Behavioral Health Initiative, CalGrows, and the Reproductive Health Care Access Initiative, which total more than $7 billion to expand the health and human services workforce.

As a workforce component of this initiative, HRTP for Healthcare prioritizes funding for training in healthcare, particularly in allied health jobs that pay at least $20/hour and do not require a four-year post-secondary degree. Many allied health jobs are middle-skill jobs (requiring more than a high school diploma but less than a four-year post-secondary degree) that are relatively well-paying, offer opportunities for career advancement, and can be excellent pathways to economic security and upward mobility. However, too many jobs in the healthcare sector (e.g., Home Health Aids, Certified Nursing Assistants) are low wage and have limited growth opportunities. Individuals in these roles are overwhelmingly people of color, and many are recent immigrants, who are locked in poverty and do not have the resources or supports to advance in their careers. Thus, the investment in allied health training seeks to ensure accessibility of pathways to economic security and advancement for members of underrepresented communities as well as meeting the state’s healthcare workforce needs.[23] 

Building Trades

Construction is also among the top-growth industry sectors and is projected to employ nearly one-million Californians (969,200) by 2030. The demand for construction workers and apprentices will only grow with passage of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), a $1.2 trillion historical investment in public transit, clean drinking water and wastewater infrastructure, clean energy transmission and Electric Vehicle (EV) infrastructure.

In this area, pay levels tend to be competitive, however, key issues are access, as 95 percent of California’s construction industry sector jobs are currently held by men.[24]

Emerging Low-Carbon Sectors

As fossil fuel production inevitably declines, statewide jobs in oil and gas production will decline with it.  As this occurs, new industries—offshore wind, various stages in the zero-emission vehicle supply chain, solar energy, building decarbonization—are emerging.

Like the demand for apprentices, the growth and development of low-carbon sectors is being driven by state and national policy in zero-emission vehicle production, emissions reduction, and alternative energy sources.

Critical work is emerging in new industries which will power the transition such as lithium extraction and offshore wind energy.

Pressing issues for workforce development include arriving at reliable estimates of job need. This is a difficult task on fields that are still under development: planning for training needs with community college and other partners, and adjudicating the profile of work in emerging sectors.

Other Growth Sectors and Industries

Besides healthcare, several other fields in the service economy projected to employ large numbers of Californians are good candidates for high road workforce development.

Accommodation and Food Services, Retail Trade, Transportation and Warehousing are all projected to be among top employment sectors in the state by 2030.[25]

Jobs in these sectors are often among the lower paying in the state. For example, hourly wages for many occupations in Accommodation and Food Services fell below $16 and $18 per hour, just above state minimum wage.[26]

Median hourly wages in Transportation and Warehousing (which include Heavy and Tractor-Trailer Truck Drivers) were higher, falling closer to $25 and $26 per hour.[27] However, entry barriers coupled with job quality concerns in trucking (high cost of obtaining a commercial driver’s license, unpaid waiting times on the job, misclassification, and stagnant wages) have served as deterrents to filling demand.[28]

Challenges for High Road Workforce Development

Inequities in job quality and access to the growth industries in the state pose challenges for equitable workforce development and growth, which the CWDB High Road programs address through four kinds of intervention: 1) Lift All Workers to the High Road; (2) Professionalize Precarious Work; (3) Democratize Access to High-Quality Middle Skill Jobs; and (4) Participatorily Plan the Low-Carbon Economy.

Many lower-paying service fields—home health and residential care, food service, retail­—are the very areas in which growth exists. The pandemic heightened public awareness of the types of non-pay-related hardships workers in frontline, shift-based, and service jobs faced: health and safety risk; emotional labor from the need to confront or manage often irate customers or clients; and the virus itself. The potential for exploitation in these jobs is high.

First Challenge

A first challenge therefore is: How can workforce development prepare workers for in-demand jobs and facilitate mobility in pay? 

Where jobs are middle-skill and good-quality, equity of access poses a challenge. These jobs are often in construction and may be accessed without a four-year academic degree through a registered apprenticeship, which has the benefit of providing earnings while gaining skills. However, in California, only 9 percent of apprentices are women and white and Hispanic males dominate.

Second Challenge

A second challenge is: How can workforce improve equity of access to already good and middle-skill jobs?

Emerging sectors represent a new arena and challenge for future-oriented workforce development. How can the state work to meet demand for training in sectors that, like offshore wind energy or lithium extraction, are only now coming online?

Third Challenge

The final challenge is: How can workforce development foster training in new low-carbon sectors that will ensure the meeting of employer needs and worker job quality?

Overarchingly, CWDB programs recognize that jobseekers, particularly those from structurally disadvantaged populations, have needs that must be addressed prior to a meaningful ability to focus on obtaining a job.

In this section, we clarify the principles that guide workforce development in a High Road vision. Subsequently, we address the four types of intervention that will allow us practically to achieve them as we meet the economic demand discussed above.

Three Principles of High Road

California’s High Road vision for the state’s workforce development system embodies the principles of job quality, worker voice, equity, and environmental sustainability. Implementing this vision through policy, programs, and other practices will benefit workers, job seekers, and industry as well as the state’s workforce development system.

Job Quality

High road employers provide quality jobs, compete based on the quality of their services and products, invest in a skilled workforce, and engage workers and their representatives in the project of building skills and competitiveness. At a minimum, quality jobs are characterized by family-supporting wages, benefits, safe working conditions, fair scheduling practices, and career advancement opportunities that are transparent.

In practice, job quality means strategically supporting California’s leading high road employers and connecting individuals to the greatest extent feasible to the best jobs. This includes supporting industry sectors where low-wage jobs are predominant as long as there are high road employers willing to invest in workers’ skills and/or develop career pathways.

Orienting the workforce development system toward job quality serves job seekers and workers by placing them in employment that allows them to sustain a high quality of life for themselves, their families, and broader community that depends on their earnings. It also levels the industry playing field by rewarding employers that follow the rules (e.g., no wage theft or worker misclassification) and compete based on quality and respect for those who help create value.

Lastly, job quality serves the workforce development system and broader public sector by protecting investments in training (i.e., ensuring that money spent on training workers is not lost as a result of turnover), an endemic problem in low-road industries and sectors.

An important guarantor and component of job quality is the presence of worker voice. As the former, worker voice refers to the ability of workers to communicate concerns and feedback comfortably and effectively on the job, without fear of retaliation. This is necessary to ensure that any violation of job quality is remedied, and that workers meaningfully share power on the job. Structurally, this takes the form of employer union neutrality, and lack of action to impede worker organizing.

As an element of job quality, worker voice describes the inclusion of worker input in production processes, and represents a participatory employment model, grounded in research findings that employers stand to gain from worker knowledge. Even in traditionally low-wage fields, treating workers as partners yields economic benefits: a Harvard study of a Fortune 500 retailer found that every dollar increase in pay translated to over 100 percent gains in productivity.[29] Further research out of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Good Jobs Institute on supermarkets and convenience stores zeroes in on just how this works: employers who pay higher wages and incorporate frontline worker input into processes (like how to standardize delivery ordering) see cost reduction via reduced turnover; labor productivity gains (from better-motivated workers and increased efficiencies facilitated through better communication, etc.); and other forms of competitive advantage.[30]

It begins with a recognition of the wisdom of workers who know their jobs best and by building an industry-driven skills infrastructure where industry means both employers as well as workers and their representatives. Structurally, this takes the form of incorporation of worker feedback into trainings, forms of profit-sharing, or even cooperative ownership.

By investing in and promoting planning with workers and management at the table, California is supporting partnerships that develop industry-led solutions to critical challenges and opportunities such as:

• Assessing current workforce gaps due to forthcoming retirements, job quality concerns, and/or insufficient training capacity;
• Addressing expected changes as a result of technology deployment including, but not limited to, automation and artificial intelligence; and
• Maintaining or increasing competitiveness in anticipation of, or in response to, market forces such as new laws and regulations as well as global trade effects.
   

Worker voice is also essential to workforce development policy and practice in order to ensure that investments in training and credentialing are connected to meaningful career advancement. In addition to benefitting workers and employers, career advancement is necessary to create opportunities for new, entry-level workers which is essential for reaching the state’s equity and inclusion goals .

The benefits and impact associated with worker voice are multiple and shared broadly. Workers can experience better working conditions and a greater sense of value and ownership on the job and within the firm by helping to make decisions that affect their livelihoods, both present and in the future. Individual firms and whole industry sectors benefit from development of new standards that can improve consistency in work and training and can support higher productivity. By focusing on developing robust solutions to critical issues identified by the industry, worker voice helps build a culture of continuous learning and collaboration, which is critical as industries change and advance over time.

Decision-makers and the public sector also gain from more widespread practice of joint labor-management planning and partnership. Gains include improved ability to manage limited resources for enforcement of employment laws (e.g., laws pertaining to wage and hour as well as health and safety) and deeper input and institutional investment in developing safeguards for workers and communities coping with disruption linked to environmental constraints, technological change, and other forces affecting employment, skills, and competitiveness.

In sector strategies, workers are not necessarily partnership stakeholders. By contrast, in High Road Training Partnerships (HRTPs) workers are integral stakeholders within the partnership.

Equity

Existing social, economic, and institutional bases of inequality mean that economic outcomes are stratified according to race, ethnicity, disability, and gender. The state’s vision and agenda therefore emphasizes equity in workforce development, with the aim of systematically increasing opportunities for Californians who have been locked out of the mainstream economy, are under-represented in high-wage occupations and industries, and/or face multiple barriers to quality employment.

Equity also means respecting and valuing the work done by immigrants, people of color, and other populations facing marginalization that is often overlooked by workforce development resources. Particularly in industries where low-wage jobs are predominant, equity strategies emphasize upskilling and professionalization that helps to standardize the work and training as well as value and compensate workers for new skills acquired through training and certification.

This vision of equity inherently involves participation of employers and often of consumers, as strategies for professionalization of non-professional or informal work (like janitorial work) often take the form of securing industry “buy-in” to a higher-cost product (a contract with a janitorial company whose workforce is certified in use of environmentally friendly products for example) in exchange for some perceived gain in the quality of what is purchased (building energy savings, for example).

A number of practices are required to achieve greater equity in labor market outcomes, including increased partnership with CBOs. CBOs are often grounded in and provide critical resources to marginalized communities which makes them invaluable partners in furthering an equitable High Road agenda. ETA’s “State Equity Reports” also provide a valuable new tool for California to evaluate and model effective strategies to promote equity and inform the state’s WIOA planning and workforce development initiatives.

Climate and Environmental Sustainability 

In addition to job quality, worker voice, and equity, California’s high road vision for workforce development addresses issues pertaining to environmental sustainability, particularly climate change. This is based on a recognition that climate change has serious implications for the state’s economy, and that the impacts of climate change disproportionately impact low-income communities and communities of color.

With respect to economy-wide implications, every occupation and industry—to varying degrees —is impacted by climate change and/or has an effect on the environment and climate. Moreover, California’s transition to a carbon neutral economy is reshaping whole industry sectors, including the occupations and employment within those sectors as well as the knowledge and skills required. Accordingly, strategic workforce development—through sector-based high road training partnerships—considers job growth, job loss, and changes in the nature of work associated with environmental change and related policies and investments. To this end, special attention must be paid to industry sectors that are on the frontlines of the transition to a carbon neutral economy (e.g., energy generation and distribution, buildings and construction, vehicle and components manufacturing, and forestry services and agriculture) while ensuring that programs and investments continue to address workforce development economy wide.

FOOTNOTES

1. See Investing in America: 5 Takeaways from the ETA 2030 Vision Convening | U.S. Department of Labor Blog (dol.gov)
2. Jobs Report: U.S. Added 336,000 Jobs in September - The New York Times (nytimes.com)
3. Using the Supplemental Poverty Measure or SPM, Poverty in the United States: 2022 (census.gov)
4. New HHS Report Shows National Uninsured Rate Reached All-Time Low in 2022 | HHS.gov
5. Researchers from the Social, Economic, and Housing Statistics Division of the U.S. Census Bureau asked the question, “In the last 7 days, how difficult has it been for your household to pay for usual household expenses, including but not limited to food, rent or mortgage, car payments, medical expenses, student loans, and so on?”. In 2020, 2021, and 2022, over 50 percent of those surveyed reported “a little,” “somewhat,” or “very” with respondents experiencing no difficulty at meeting household expenses in the minority in each year. SEHSD_wp2023_03.pdf (census.gov)
6. EDD Labor Market Information Division - Home Page (ca.gov)
7. Poverty in California (ppic.org)
8. Ibid
9. Who is Experiencing Housing Hardship in California? - California Budget and Policy Center (calbudgetcenter.org)
10. For full detail, visit Employment Projections (ca.gov), select Long-Term Projections, and sort by Projected Year Employment Estimate, 2030.
11. Investing in America: 5 Takeaways from the ETA 2030 Vision Convening | U.S. Department of Labor Blog (dol.gov); Investing in Nursing = A Better Care Economy | U.S. Department of Labor Blog (dol.gov)
12. EDD-LMID. 2020-2030 California Industry Sector and Supersector Employment Projections
13. Employment Projections (ca.gov)
14. California Future Health Workforce Commission 2019, p. 14
15. Ibid, p. 16
16. Spetz 2022
17. EDD-LMID quarterly wage projections for California for Q1 of 2023 (CA-OEWS-California Statewide-2023.xlsx (live.com)
18. Muramatsu et al. 2019; Cao 2020
19. Employed persons by detailed occupation, sex, race, and Hispanic or Latino ethnicity : U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (bls.gov)
20. PPIC 2014, p. 7
21. California Future Health Workforce Commission 2019, pp. 5, 12
22. Workforce for a Healthy California - California Health and Human Services
23. Healthcare High Road Training Partnership Overview
24. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Survey of Households, Annual Social and Economic Supplement (March 2023), compiled by: EDD-Labor Market Information Division, September 2023
25.  Employment Projections (ca.gov), select Long-Term Projections, and sort by Projected Year Employment Estimate, 2030.
26. See CA-OEWS-California Statewide-2023.xlsx (live.com) for estimated wages for Q1 of 2023 in California.
27. Ibid
28. The Great American Trucker Shortage Isn't Real | Time; Truck Stop: How One of America’s Steadiest Jobs Turned Into One of Its Most Grueling - The Atlantic.
29.  Emanuel, N. and Harrington, E. (2020). The Payoffs of Higher Pay: Elasticities of Productivity and Labor Supply With Respect to Wage. Working paper. emanuel_jmp.pdf (harvard.edu)
30. The Case for Good Jobs (hbr.org)  [YM1] 
31.  At the time of drafting in late 2023, the California minimum wage is $15.50/hour. On January 1, 2024, the state minimum wage undergoes an increase to $16/hour. For further detail, please see: California’s Minimum Wage to Increase to $16 per hour in January 2024 | California Department of Industrial Relations. Employment Projections (ca.gov). Home Health and Personal Care Aides (the top growth occupation) pays $15.21/hour, Fast Food and Counter Workers make $15.61/hour, Cashiers earn $15.00/hour, Retail Salespersons, $15.34, Farmworkers and Laborers, $15/hour, and Waiters and Waitresses, $15.51/hour. (The occupations with median pay below current statewide minimum wage are explained by the fact that wages are from Q1 of 2022). See: Employment Projections (ca.gov).
32. Non-standard forms of employment (Non-standard forms of employment) (ilo.org)
33. Low-wage Work Uncertainty often Traps Low-wage Workers - Center for Poverty and Inequality Research (ucdavis.edu); Hard Times: Routine Schedule Unpredictability and Material Hardship among Service Sector Workers | Harvard Kennedy School
34.  For instance: Executive Order N-79-20, requiring 100 percent of in-state sales of new passenger vehicles and drayage trucks to be zero-emission by 2035, with medium- and heavy-duty vehicles to follow in 2045; and SB 32, requiring CA to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to 40percent below 1990 levels by 2030.
35.  Employment Projections (ca.gov)
36.  See Section 1720 of the Labor Code on requirements associated with Public Works.
37.  Registration Dashboard | Tableau Public
38. Bill Text - AB-2288 Apprenticeship programs: building and construction trades. (ca.gov); AB 2288 modified CUSB1 Workforce Guidelines, High Road Construction Careers IC Section 14230(e) to require the State Board and each Local Board to ensure that WIOA funds respectively awarded by them for pre-apprenticeship training in the building and construction trades, fund programs and services that follow MultiCraft Core Curriculum (MC3). The law also requires that providers of pre-apprenticeship programs funded with WIOA funds help increase the representation of women in those trades by developing a plan for outreach and retention of women in these pre-apprenticeship programs. See: DIRECTIVE-QUALITY APPRENTICESHIP AND PRE-APPRENTICESHIP OPPORTUNITY (ca.gov)
39. SB1 Workforce Guidelines, High Road Construction Careers, p. 4
40. Joseph Hayes and Laura Hill. Undocumented Immigrants in California. Public Policy Institute of California.
41. National Network for Youth. LGBTQ+ Youth Homelessness.
42. Davalos, Monica. Homelessness in California: A Statewide Challenge. California Budget and Policy Center.
43. Ibid
44. The US Department of Housing and Urban Development defines CoC programs as those that are designed to promote communitywide commitment to the goal of ending homelessness by providing funding for efforts by nonprofit providers and state and local governments, as well as promoting access to, and effective utilization of, mainstream programs by homeless individuals and families.
45. Malka, Ari & Sainz, Robert. 2022 California Opportunity Youth Data Report: An Updated Analysis of California’s Opportunity Youth.
46. National Equity Atlas. Disconnected Youth: All Young People Should be Educated, Healthy, and Ready to Thrive in the Workforce. 
47. California Opportunity Youth Network. Eliminating Barriers to WIOA Services for Systems-Involved Youth. 
48.  Microsoft Word - Sector_Strategy_Final_Report_March_2017.docx (utexas.edu)
49. UCLA Labor Center. “HRTPs: A Unique Sector Strategy”.
50.  High Road Training Partnerships | CWDB (ca.gov)
51.  Ibid
52.  Ibid
53. Putting California on the High Road: A Jobs and Climate Action Plan for 2030 (berkeley.edu), Chapter 2, “Demand Side Workforce Policy Levers,” p. 71.

UPDATE

Federal Feedback: Include a description of areas of opportunity for meeting hiring, education, and skills needs identified in the economy for individuals with disabilities.

Response:  

Areas of opportunity for people with disabilities in the California economy

The Landscape of Californians with Disabilities

In September 2023, persons with disabilities made up 3.5 percent of the state’s civilian labor force, which was comprised of 19.2 million persons. The civilian labor force for persons with disabilities was made up of 608,300 employed and 70,500 unemployed persons during that period of time. The unemployment rate and labor force participation rate for this segment of the California labor force were 10.4 percent and 21.6 percent, respectively. 

For persons with disabilities, the largest number of employed persons worked within the health care and social assistance (89,700) industry. Over 50,000 persons with disabilities were employed in each of these industries in September 2023: educational services (66,700), retail trade (65,700), and construction (52,500). In addition, over 30,000 persons with disabilities held jobs in each of the following industries: public administration (39,600), durable goods manufacturing (38,600), accommodation and food services (37,100), and transportation and warehousing (30,700) industries.

In terms of occupations, the jobs held most often by employed persons with disabilities in 2023 were in office and administrative support (84,700); management (81,000); transportation and material moving (45,400); and sales and related (45,300). Also, employed persons with disabilities held over 20,000 jobs within each of the following industries: healthcare support (28,400); building and grounds cleaning and maintenance (26,200); food preparation and serving related (25,100); healthcare practitioner and technical (23,500); and production (20,200) fields.

In 2023, 31.0 percent of employed persons with a disability had attained a bachelor’s degree or higher. A breakout of this collective level of educational attainment of employed persons with a disability is as follows: bachelor’s degree (113,800), master’s degree (52,100), doctorate degree (14,600), and professional degree (9,600). One out of every five persons with a disability (22.6 percent) held a high school diploma or general education diploma. In addition, 56,100 employed persons with a disability had not completed high school.

The 10.4 percent unemployment rate among Californians with disabilities was more than double the 4.3 percent unemployment rate of Californians without a disability. Approximately one out of every five (21.6 percent) Californians with a disability participated in the civilian labor force. In addition, their labor force participation rate remained at least 45.3 percentage points lower than that of persons who did not have a disability. The older age profile of Californians with a disability in comparison to those without a disability affects these results.

Current Work

The CWDB and the DOR have a thriving partnership and continue to look for opportunities to expand their partnership work. The CWDB serves on several DOR committees, including Assistive Technology Advisory Committee, California Youth Leadership Forum, and the California Committee on the Employment of People with Disabilities (CCEPD).

The CCEPD releases an Annual Report on employment of people with disabilities. Throughout 2023, the CCEPD held a series of listening sessions with local workforce areas statewide to collect information on their highlights and challenges when serving people with disabilities. From these listening sessions, the CCEPD compiled a best practices toolkit to help promote and replicate service delivery practices and policy recommendations that support employment outcomes for people with disabilities.

In May 2023, the CCEPD approved a Workforce Best Practice Toolkit, and it was submitted to the DOR and the EDD. While primarily developed for workforce development boards and America's Job Centers of California (AJCCs), this toolkit has useful information that will benefit any workforce partner. The toolkit recommendations are intended to encourage workforce partners to replicate best practices, as needed in their organizations, and to highlight models that can often be used within organizations.

This toolkit is organized into the following topics:

• Accessibility and Accommodations
• Benefits Planning
• Co-Enrollment and Cross-Training
• Customer Centered Design
• Employer Engagement
• Funding
• Workforce Readiness Skills Development

In August 2023, the CCEPD approved the workforce best practices policy recommendations and submitted them to the DOR and the EDD for informal feedback. The CCEPD held a webinar on November 8, 2023 to present an overview of the toolkit designed to encourage workforce areas to adopt best practices in serving people with disabilities, and more organizations to develop partnerships with workforce and disability-focused organizations.

Opportunities

There are several opportunities that the CWDB will begin to develop:

• Work with the CCEPD to highlight and expand best practices for service delivery for people with disabilities.
• Research programmatic accessibility to understand continued low participation of individuals with disabilities in workforce development programs.
• Identify specific strategies for competitive integrated employment (CIE) for job seekers with disabilities.

Federal Feedback: The plan must include how the state of California will assess the overall effectiveness of the workforce development system in the State in relation to the strategic vision and goals stated above in sections (b)(1), (2), and (3) and how it will use the results of this assessment, which may include evaluation findings, and other feedback to make continuous or quality improvements as required on section b, part 4.

Response: 

Assessment

CWDB uses third-party evaluators to assess all its funded programs.  The following are the completed third-party evaluations (Breaking Barriers 1.0, AJCC, RPI, and CAAL-Skills 1.0).  These evaluations used as source material provided by participating grantees in each of the programs the following: (a) background documents (b) narrative reports (c) surveys (d) interviews and (e) administrative data.  The research questions focused on an analysis of (i) grantee programs’ service delivery and design; (ii) participant outcomes; and (iii) system outcomes.  The findings were discussed at four levels: enrollments and participation in the program; provision of services; partnership development; and participant and program level outcomes. 

While each of these evaluations have specific conclusions and implications, the general observations to be made here is that there was need to standardize program elements, refine technical assistance particularly around data collection and reporting, and develop a common research design framework. Going forward, all state-funded grant program data will be entered into a single data warehouse (the CAL-E-Grants system) with common data elements and specifications. CWDB Research and Evaluation Staff are developing a variety of supporting documents for use by grantees for data collection, reporting, and validation. 

While each evaluation will have its own focus, CWDB Research and Evaluation Staff have asked third-party evaluators, at a minimum, to indicate up front in their submitted research design the following. First, to clearly identify in the proposal the type of evaluation (process, output and outcome, and impact) they would be undertaking realizing that all three can be potentially possible given a sufficient timeframe.  Second, clearly indicate which data elements from the standardized list would be included in the evaluation and indicate those that are over and above what is typically collected in the CWDB warehouse.   Third, a description of the methodological approach (qualitative, quantitative, mixed methods) the third-party evaluator would undertake.  Lastly, and maybe the most important, include in the research design, a discussion of lessons learned that implications for future workforce development policy as well as suggestions for improving future evaluations.

The next round of third-party evaluations will focus on the HRTP/HRCC, P2E 2.0, Breaking Barriers 2.0, and RERP.  Of these, only the HRTP/HRCC has been underway for a year with the rest either just beginning or yet to begin. Also, the evaluation for P2E 1.0 is nearing completion with a report due Fall 2024.

Results of the High Road evaluation will provide evidence for the efficacy of CWDB’s overall High Road approach, which has been summarized in the preceding. Specifically, the evaluation will focus on efficacy of a partnership approach that brings together industry, worker representatives, educational providers, and community organizations to collaboratively address the skill needs of employers in tandem with the training and job quality needs of individual workforce participants. An interim report based on qualitative analysis will be forthcoming in late spring or early summer 2024, with final report including quantitative analysis to be finalized in 2025.

The evaluation focuses on developing a theoretical framework and attendant measures that are able to fully account for the partnership-focused workforce development approach that is summarized in California’s “four-intervention” model. Doing so necessitates developing both a clear conceptualization of all posited outcomes, both participant-level and system-level (e.g. impacts on climate resilience) and attendant qualitative and quantitative metrics. For example, developing a way to measure the positive impact on local communities & student learning of a workforce training project that trains school food workers in preparing nutritious meals.

Findings are expected, in particular, to inform the development and use of system metrics (climate impacts of workforce investments; benefits to participating employers) that can in future be included in RFAs and applied to measure the efficacy of High Road programs.

Other ongoing evaluations address CWDB’s targeting of interventions to specific underserved populations. These include a 2.0 evaluation of the Prison to Employment program, currently in-process. The P2E 2.0 evaluation is investigating new research questions, including identifying why program effects vary across individuals, that emerged from the P2E 1.0 evaluation. It will also extend the P2E 1.0 analysis using the latest longitudinal data as it becomes available through the course of the contract. Additionally, a 2.0 evaluation of the Breaking Barriers program will describe the following characteristics of the cohort of Breaking Barriers grantees funded under AB 628 (the second cohort): 1) organizational features (e.g., geographic areas served, location within local workforce areas, funding levels, history, staffing levels, etc.); 2) the numbers and types of individuals with high barriers to employment grantees plan to and actually do serve (i.e., target populations) under their Breaking Barriers grants; 3) the composition of staff, including whether staff are representative of the target populations they seek to serve; and 4) the service delivery models and strategies grantees plan to use and actually implement under their grants. The evaluators also plan to compare what the grantees provide versus what was planned, and these features in comparison to grantees from the AB 1111-funded first cohort. These evaluations will yield more fine-grained insights regarding the performance of the fourth intervention type, Lifting All Workers to the High Road by removing employability barriers for the most underserved workers.

The 2.0 evaluation of CAAL-Skills workforce system data will evaluate the California workforce system as a whole. In particular, the refined and expanded research design (improved comparison groups, expanded outcome measures) is expected to provide greater insights into efficacy of those programs which could not be effectively evaluated in the 1.0 report because of their divergence from an assumed adult-unemployed-jobseeker model. A learnings memo was developed by the Labor and Workforce Development Agency to guide evaluators toward this expanded evaluation agenda. In addition, work is underway to create an interactive dashboard that will enable members of the public as well as policymakers to make informed choices about training program enrollment based on available information.

Complementary to this endeavor is work to develop data standards so that participant outcomes can be tracked and assessed with consistency across all of California’s workforce development programs, as well as to ensure that demographic data (e.g., sex and gender) are reported in accordance with current scholarship and standards. Work in this area, stimulated by the SB 755 legislation that expands the data collected on workforce participants, has been ongoing since early 2023. The ultimate goal from the lessons learned from all past and current third-party evaluations is to continue refining and adjusting policy and program based on data-driven insights, and establishing the CWDB approach to third-party evaluations as evidence-based practice.

Rates of labor force participation (21.6%, at least 45.3 percentage points lower than that of persons who did not have a disability) remained lower and rates of unemployment higher (10.4% compared with 4.3% in the population as a whole) for Californians with disabilities. The state’s disability population is a target of numerous CWDB grant initiatives, including High Road Training Partnerships and in particular, Breaking Barriers which focuses on providing individuals with barriers to employment the services they need to enter, participate in, and complete boarder workforce preparation, training, and education programs aligned with regional labor market need.

Comparison of Economic & Workforce Analytical Conclusion:

California’s projected jobs growth, as discussed at length in the preceding, provides three key areas of opportunity and need where policy can proactively address the hiring, education, and skills needs of employers, the workforce, and the state as a whole.

These areas of opportunity and need represent meeting-points between the statewide labor force and the ongoing needs of the state as it responds to needs of the population, environment, and workforce as well as the impacts of both state and federal climate-related mandates and investments. These in turn pave the way for several discrete policy interventions defined below.

The first area of need and opportunity is in healthcare, broadly responding to an aging Californian population. Individual and family services, the sector which includes in-home health supportive services jobs, was one of 3 top industries to add jobs in the period September 2018-September 2023 and is projected to continue its growth (p. 39). This trend will be fueled by an aging population. Health care and social assistance is a long-term growth sector; elder care such as In-home health care services, nursing, and assisted living should be in high demand as the large Baby Boomer generation ages into their advanced years (p. 39). Growth in this and other service sectors, which are often characterized by both lower pay and unstable, temporary employment patterns, presents need and opportunity for workforce policy to address worker, consumer, and employer needs by promoting the professional training and advancement of workers as well as addressing emergent skill needs as affected by the aforementioned demographic shift alongside climate change (e.g. increased need for first responders in healthcare). Here, the core intervention that is needed lies in upskilling an incumbent workforce that is disproportionately composed of women, immigrants, and persons of color.

Funding training programs that emphasize credentialing workers in service professions will not only address employer and population needs but also the interest of economic equity for workers.

The second area of need and opportunity is in construction. The construction industry is expected to continue to add new jobs to meet California’s need for new housing stock, and in response to an infusion of funds from the federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that was passed in November 2021, continued spending on high-speed rail, and the conversion of office space left vacant by the expansion of remote work to more mixed uses. This will require training new entrants. In particular, there is opportunity to “democratize” accessibility of what has been an insular and male-dominated field. Here, successful approaches will (a) provide education in prerequisite areas such as math to correct for the impacts of an uneven public education system; (b) make broadly available information necessary to navigate the construction field; (c) train pre-apprentices in a breadth of base skills to ensure future-proof skillset; and (d) create strong connections on the supply-side through outreach and the demand-side through strategic use of levers like Project Labor Agreements and Community Workforce Agreements. Such practices will help alleviate current labor market imbalances that see women among the most underrepresented in the construction field (10.6%) (p. 56) which falls in the high-to-middle pay range and represents a viable pathway to remunerative work for those lacking a postsecondary degree (p. 57). Taking these measures will ensure the continued accessibility of what is already the major career route for those lacking a postsecondary degree (p. 57).

The third area is in emerging industry, including high-technology industry, spurred by federal investment and state climate mandates. Strong defense spending and the nation’s emerging industrial policy, including the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022 should provide a further boost to California’s high technology and advanced manufacturing sector. Meanwhile, state-level environmental targets (such as the transition to 100% new vehicle ZEV sales by 2035) will increase demand. Here, there is need and opportunity to promote partnership models for jobs planning, in which worker representatives, employers, and the state’s community college system collaboratively design training curricula. There is also opportunity to partner with local communities in which these industries will be concentrated to ensure that investments in training will translate to jobs for local populations, specifically through inclusion of local hire measures.

In pursuing all of these aims, California will prioritize the most underserved to ensure that all benefit from access to high-quality jobs and from measures to improve the quality of existing jobs and collaboratively plan for future industrial needs. This includes the formerly incarcerated population, who face such major impediments to finding stable work that one-half fail to do so within a year of release (p. 70); veterans, who face higher rates of unemployment than the general population; youth; persons with disabilities, and other groups. To do so, it will follow the strategies outlined as the Four Interventions in the Strategic Elements portion of this State Plan document.