Federal Employment: Displaced Federal Workers can be Helped by Expanding Existing Programs

Federal job placement programs, particularly OPM's, are not placing a high proportion of registrants in jobs. In fiscal year 1991, DOD's Priority Placement Program placed 5,747, or 23 percent, of participating employees. OPM reported placing 58 of over 4,000 registrants governmentwide during the same period. Most registrants in OPM's programs during fiscal year 1991 were DOD employees. Unlike DOD'S program, agencies considering registrants from OPM's programs can cancel their vacancies or fill them through other competitive or noncompetitive means. Current databases on federal job openings and job seekers could be expanded and linked to provide displaced workers with a more comprehensive listing of available federal job openings, and prospective employers with a more complete listing of displaced employees who are seeking work. This could be accomplished with the purchase of additional computer hardware and software at an estimated cost of $2.2 million, additional telephone lines at an annual cost of about $90,000, and two or three additional OPM staff to operate the systems. Further, OPM's Federal Job Opportunities Listing and the Defense Outplacement Referral System are of limited value to displaced federal workers; the former because it does not list all of the federal jobs for which the displaced workers could qualify, and the latter because it does not refer all displaced workers to prospective federal and nonfederal employers. Also, as a result of states' differing interpretations of job retraining eligibility requirements, displaced workers face significantly different eligibility standards for federally funded job retraining.