Barriers to Retraining: The Impact of Occupational Licensing upon the Trade Adjustment Assistance Program

Abstract

There has been research done into the outcomes of the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) program, as well as research done on the impact of occupational licensing requirements, but there has been little examination of the interaction between the two policies. This paper adds to the existing TAA and occupational licensing literature by seeking to understand the causes of the limited success of the TAA program, by examining the impact of occupational licensing on program outcomes.