Can training programmes reshape America’s workforce?

Extracted 31AUG2011 from http://www.economist.com/node/21526915?fsrc=scn/tw/te/ar/workersandbusinessunite

Mr Obama will.. reiterate his commitment to workforce training, which helps people polish their skills, or acquire new ones, through specialised training schemes, mostly at community colleges, designed in collaboration with the private sector and local officials... Many companies actually have slots available, but cannot find people qualified to fill them...

Karen Elzey, the director of the Aspen Institute’s Skills for America’s Future initiative—one of the efforts that Mr Obama is boosting—explains that her group is focused on working with companies and community colleges to develop skills among workers who are already in an area, rather than looking at possible relocations...