Search Acceleration versus Employability Decay
RCTReview
Job search counseling helps unemployed individuals navigate hiring processes and connect with employers faster, which accelerates job matching in the short run. However, unless counseling improves underlying skills or job quality, it merely reschedules when employment occurs rather than increasing total long-term employment rates.
Picture this
Think of paying for express shipping on a package versus changing what is inside the box. The package arrives at the front door a few days earlier, but the contents of the box remain identical. Over a longer timeframe, having received the package early does not increase the total number of items delivered.
What the evidence says
Treated job seekers had a statistically significant 2.5 percentage point employment advantage over untreated peers at 8 months, but by 12 and 20 months, employment rates between treated and comparison groups were identical.
- Who was studied
- Nearly 30,000 young, college-educated French job seekers in mid-twenties tracked across 235 communities over nearly two years.
- How
- Clustered randomized evaluation measuring long-term employment rates at 8, 12, and 20 months following the offer of intensive career counseling.
What to do
Measure employment policy impacts over multi-year horizons to ensure interventions create sustainable labor market attachment rather than brief search acceleration.
From the source
"Individuals in the treatment group found work more quickly than those in the comparison group in the same areas, but these gains disappeared after twelve months."
briefcase_job-placement-and-displacement.pdf