JPMorgan Chase & Co’s New Skills at Work Initiative Will Partner with the White House to Focus on Long Term Unemployed Workers

NEW YORK, JANUARY 31, 2014 /3BL Media/– JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE:JPM) today announced that New Skills at Work – its landmark, $250 million global effort to close the skills gap – will partner with the White House and use its ground-breaking local workforce research to provide critical data on the challenges facing the long-term unemployed. 

New Skills at Work aims to help people get the training they need to compete for the jobs that are available today and into the future.

“We welcome the opportunity to work with the Administration to rally employers across our economy to build industry-based workforce partnerships that can align our investments in education and skills training with current job openings and future career pathways,” said JPMorgan Chase Chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon.  

“Even though unemployment is high, we hear from our business clients every day about the challenges they face finding workers with the right skills for jobs that are open right now,” said Dimon. “That’s why we are working with community leaders across the country – technical training programs, community colleges, policymakers and employers – to address this skills gap.

Joseph Carbone, President and CEO, The WorkPlace, and a key participant in today’s White House event on developing a skilled workforce, said, “An essential tool in helping the long-term unemployed return to work is innovative, data-driven industry intelligence on the needs of the business community. New Skills at Work will encourage collaboration between employers and training partners while being a guide for targeted investments to increase worker capacity.”

JPMorgan Chase & Co. recently launched New Skills at Work, a five-year workforce readiness and demand-driven training initiative.  Working closely with local businesses, elected officials, academics and community leaders, JPMorgan Chase will use new data and industry intelligence to direct grants and forge partnerships to help close the skills gap. 

To achieve this goal, communities need reliable local level data to tell them exactly which skills are needed in which sectors, in order to drive strategic local workforce planning. New Skills will begin its work in nine cities -- Chicago, Columbus, Dallas, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, and the San Francisco Bay Area – and will, as the first step in improving workforce training, develop new data to create regional gap reports that analyze the specific skill needs in each community.

Those gap reports, Dimon said, will now incorporate research into and analysis of challenges facing long term unemployed workers. “We recognize how important it is to help the long-term unemployed get back to work.  Our skills initiative can help provide needed analysis of the challenges that the long-term unemployed face and a picture of the job opportunities available to those who develop specialized skills through focused and effective training.  With this data in hand, the public, private and non-profit sectors can work together to give aspiring workers the training they need to obtain the jobs that are available in their community.”

About JPMorgan Chase & Co.
JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) is a leading global financial services firm with assets of $2.4 trillion and operations worldwide. The Firm is a leader in investment banking, financial services for consumers and small businesses, commercial banking, financial transaction processing, asset management and private equity. A component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, JPMorgan Chase & Co. serves millions of consumers in the United States and many of the world's most prominent corporate, institutional and government clients under its J.P. Morgan and Chase brands. The Firm and its Foundation give approximately $200 million annually to nonprofit organizations around the world and lead volunteer service activities for employees in local communities, utilizing its many resources, including access to capital, strength, global reach and expertise.  More information is available at www.jpmorganchase.com.

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