Work That Lasts: A Blueprint for Durable Exits from Poverty

Abstract

Durable exits from poverty need five things at once: a buyer for the work, the capability to do it, the means to reach the place where capability is built, a wage that lifts the household, and protection for those who cannot work. Each has been tried alone, and each has fallen short: training without a buyer produces certificates, investment without a workforce imports one, and tuition without the bus fare can produce dropouts. This paper proposes a design that starts with the buyer, an employer with a funded position or a market with unmet need, verified to exist before any money moves, and plays six instruments together: open the door; bring the buyer; build the capability against the buyer; fund attendance; verify fair work; catch those who cannot. It covers countries where buyers already exist, with the United States as the illustration, and countries where they are few. It proposes one independent organization, working with the United Nations, whose funds are held by a trustee and which pays them out itself, governed in two equal groups: those who fund it and those who implement it. Training providers are paid mainly on measured results. The program publishes five numbers every year and states in advance seven results that would prove the design wrong. The paper states no cost per person and claims no number of jobs. It asks for a test, not for endorsement: one cohort in one country, chosen by the board against published criteria, run as three groups by lottery.