WIA was enacted in response to a variety of concerns about how employment and training programs were designed and operated. Among these concerns, it was noted that a multitude of employment and training programs¿including those operating under the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA), Vocational Rehabilitation, Adult Vocational Education, the Trade Adjustment Assistance Act, the Job Service, and a variety of welfare-to-work funding streams, to name just a few¿operated often without effective coordination or collaboration. The resulting system, it was feared, resulted in redundancies and inefficiencies and confronted customers with a confusing maze of programs through which they found it difficult to navigate.

Second, JTPA services were limited to those who met narrowly circumscribed eligibility criteria, meaning that access to even basic career planning tools was sharply restricted. As the U.S. workforce development system moved towards a One-Stop service delivery system over the last several years, these eligibility restrictions caused awkward problems regarding sources of funding and staffing support.

Third, for those undertaking training, choices among courses of study and available providers were often limited to a preselected vendor or set of vendors with which the local workforce program had worked out prior agreements. Moreover, information about the performance and costs of different providers was extremely hard to come by, making it difficult for both customers and case managers to make wise choices.

Finally, the accountability system under JTPA often focused primarily on

avoiding poor performance rather than on achieving "world class" standards.

Moreover, programs that operated under funding streams other than JTPA often had no accountability system based on outcomes at all. Ensuring accountability under such circumstances, let alone striving for high performance, was thus often difficult.