Resource Library

The Chief Evaluation Office of the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL CEO) is committed to using innovative tools to meet the Department’s research, evaluation, and data analytics needs. In December 2021, DOL CEO commissioned the Westat Insight and American Institutes for Research® (AIR®) study team to explore potential opportunities to use machine learning methods to facilitate the automated data collection of labor-relevant data.

Employment in the construction industry continues to grow as legislation, such as the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act1 (IJA), and overall economic trends create increased demand for construction workers (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, 2023). This anticipated growth and ongoing expansion of the construction industry may serve as an opportunity to build a more representative and equitable construction workforce.

This brief, produced under the Apprenticeship Evidence-Building and Administrative Data Research and Analysis portfolios of studies, examines the participation of women and people of color (i.e., people who are not white) in construction apprenticeships to understand whether the underrepresentation of these groups in construction is reproduced in the apprenticeship system.

The discussion paper explores issues related to research on application or user fees in programs administered by U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL’s) Employment and Training Administration (ETA), based on a review of regulations, guidance, and selected research concerning such fees. The paper reviews available literature from those sources; briefly covers the purposes, general principles and practices related to application or user fees; summarizes possible factors related to research on such fees; and suggests some possible research activities on use of fees in an ETA program.

The Navajo Nation Research Brief of the Black Lung Incidence Study identifies the current state of knowledge on black lung disease as it relates to coal mining and residential coal use in the Navajo Nation. It identifies prevalence rates in the U.S. counties that overlap with the Navajo Nation borders, estimates prevalence rates in those counties, and discusses data limitations specific to the Navajo Nation.

The report presents the findings of a literature review ad quantitative analysis conducted under the Black Lung Incidence Study. The study was designed to examine black lung incidence in the United States, exploring both cases and deaths. Within this scope, the study examined whether black lung incidence is higher among specific subpopulations of interest, including miners, mining communities, the Navajo Nation, and residents of Appalachia.

One component of the Mine Safety and Health Administration’s (MSHA’s) mission to “prevent death, illness, and injury from mining and promote safe and healthful workplaces for U.S. miners” is protecting coal miners and coal mining communities from black lung disease (“Mission”). In support of that mission, the literature review expands the U.S.

In 2019, the Chief Evaluation Office (CEO) partnered with the Employment and Training Administration (ETA) to fund contractors Urban Institute, Mathematica Policy Research, and Capital Research Corporation to design and conduct analysis to build and expand the evidence portfolio on apprenticeships, including models, components, partnerships, and strategies that often include the work of community colleges. 

Specific studies include:

In 2023 the Chief Evaluation Office (CEO) partnered with Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) and funded contractors Insight Policy Research and Urban Institute to conduct a series of analyses presented in Building an Equitable Construction Workforce: Understanding and Increasing the Proportion of Women and People of Color in Construction under the Administrative Data Research and Analysis and

In 2022, the Chief Evaluation Office (CEO) partnered with the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) and commissioned contractor Summit Consulting, LLC (Summit) to conduct the Black Lung Incidence Study under the Administrative Data Research and Analysis portfolio of studies.