Training costs and participation: evidence from a voucher program reform in Korea

Using Korean administrative data and a triple-difference design, we examine a 2020 reform that implemented co-payments for employed trainees. A 10-percentage-point increase in the co-payment rate is estimated to reduce monthly participation by 31.4 trainees and course provision by 3.4 courses per occupation–employment-status cell. College-educated participants exhibit more negative point estimates. Sensitivity analyses indicate that participation estimates are less robust to departures from parallel trends compared to course-provision estimates. These findings indicate that greater cost sharing may reduce participation and course availability in publicly financed vocational training.