Upskilling unemployed adults: The organisation, profiling and targeting of training provision

Training and education for the unemployed has a long tradition in Denmark and especially came into focus with the labour market reforms in the early 1990s. During the last decade the use of training and education however became subject to criticism. Higher priority was given to programmes that were more job-targeted like training counselling, traineeships and wage-subsidies. The main reason for this policy shift was the rising demand for labour and the low unemployment in the years preceding the present economic crisis. Also, evaluation studies generally found limited and often even negative effects of educational programmes.