STOCK MARKET WATCH -- Tuesday, 26 June 2012

[Demeter]

9. Germany's New Export: Jobs Training

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303665904577452521454725242.html

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn.—Germany's transplant-factories, like the sprawling Volkswagen AG VOW.XE -2.42% complex here, aren't just cranking out cars, machinery and chemicals. They're also bringing a German training system that could help narrow America's skilled labor gap.

Volkswagen, whose auto factory will graduate its first class of U.S. apprentices next year, is one of dozens of companies introducing training that combine German-style apprenticeships and vocational schooling.

These worker training programs are winning U.S. adherents as manufacturers grapple with a paradox: Though unemployment remains stuck above 8%, companies can't find enough machinists, robotics specialists and other highly skilled workers to maintain their factory floors. An estimated 600,000 skilled, middle-class manufacturing jobs remain unfilled nationwide, even as millions of Americans search for work.

"We've learned it is better to build our own workforce instead of just relying on the market," said Hans-Herbert Jagla, Volkswagen's human resources chief at its one-year-old Chattanooga plant. The German car maker has launched a three-year apprenticeship program to ensure it has skilled workers to maintain and troubleshoot the car maker's high-tech robotics and assembly line systems.

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