Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, May 4, 1993                   TAG: 9305040070
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

STUDY SHOWS TRAINING WAGE DIDN'T WORK

"The report finds that the degree to which the training wage has been used is very low," the department said in a report to Congress. It added that the study "produced no evidence that the training wage had an effect on employment."

The training wage let employers pay unskilled youths 85 percent of the minimum wage while they received on-the-job training. Congress enacted it in 1989 for a three-year experiment as a compromise after then-President Bush vetoed an increase in the minimum wage that year. It went into effect April 1, 1990, and expired March 31.

The Bush administration had insisted the training wage was needed to provide opportunities for young people under 20 and to help offset job losses caused by raising the minimum wage.

Democrats opposed it but were forced to concede the issue to Bush to get any increase in the minimum wage. As a result, the minimum wage was raised in increments from $3.35 an hour to $4.25.

But "nobody used" the training wage, said John Zalusky, an economist for the AFL-CIO.

The wage was "a joke and a cruel hoax played on young employees, and an unattractive hiring tool for business," said Richard Berman, executive director of the Employment Policies Institute.

The law permitted employers to pay the low wage during a 90-day training period if they did not replace workers earning the $4.25 minimum wage. When it expired, the training wage was $3.61.