The Stratification of Youth Training∗

This article is based on surveys in 1988 among representative samples totalling 4,247 16‐19 year olds from four areas (Kirkcaldy, Liverpool, Sheffield and Swindon), of whom 1,562 had some experience of Youth Training (YT). The young people's likelihood of entering YT depended primarily on their educational qualifications and where they lived. Trainees’ chances of being kept on by the firms where they were trained depended mainly on their types of schemes and their performances during training, indicated by whether or not they earned any additional qualifications. The chances of those not retained moving immediately to jobs with other firms were more dependent on their school‐leaving qualifications and where they lived. The authors interpret their evidence to argue that employers’ uses of YT in the late‐1980s were creating increasingly clear divisions between sponsorship, contest and warehousing sectors.