Employment, Retention and Advancement Programme: Public Use File, 2004-2010

The UK Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) programme sought to improve the labour market prospects of low-paid workers and long-term unemployed people. Launched in 2003 in selected Jobcentre Plus offices, which administer Government cash benefits and employment services, the programme was envisioned as a 'next step' in British welfare-to-work policies.<br> <br> Over 16,000 people from six regions of Britain (East Midlands, London, North East England, North West England, Scotland, and Wales) applied to the programme. In order to test conclusively whether or not ERA really helped those who volunteered for it, half were randomly assigned to the programme, and the remainder served as a 'business-as-usual' control group – a counterfactual, which did not receive any assistance from ERA and thus provided a benchmark indicating what would have happened in the absence of the ERA programme. By randomly dividing the sample into these two groups, the study was able to test conclusively whether or not ERA helped its participants work more, earn more, advance further, and achieve better outcomes in other areas than they would have without ERA's help. The evaluation also included an assessment of the programme's implementation, a cost-benefit analysis, and several special studies.<br> <br> The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) oversaw the overall implementation and evaluation of the programme. A research consortium carried out the study. The consortium was headed by MDRC (headquartered in New York City), and in Britain it included the Policy Studies Institute, the Institute for Fiscal Studies, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, and the Office for National Statistics. A subsidiary goal of the project was to help build capacity in Britain to conduct randomised trials of promising social innovations. This was accomplished through direct collaborative work between the US and British research partners and DWP, and also through broader US-UK learning exchanges involving practitioners and researchers.<br> <br>