The effectiveness of the Youth Training Scheme as a manpower policy

Using data from the 1985 and 1986 Scottish Young People's Surveys, this paper attempts to measure the effectiveness of the Youth Training Scheme by estimating the impact of YTS participation on both the subsequent probability of employment and the subsequent earnings potential. YTS is found to have a positive impact on the probability of employment. After allowing for possible sample-selection bias owing to participation on YTS being non-random, there are indications that YTS may have a positive impact on subsequent wages, but the estimates are so imprecise that it was not possible to draw any statistically significant conclusions about wage effects.