TAA reauthorization deal reached.

The White House and congressional leaders have reportedly reached a deal to reauthorize the federal Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) program as part of a larger compromise advancing pending free trade agreements with South Korea, Panama, and Colombia. The deal comes roughly six weeks after the administration announced it would not submit the trade agreements for congressional approval without a deal to extend TAA, a position that received strong support from House and Senate Democrats, as well as a bipartisan group of governors.

TAA, which provides job training and other benefits to workers who have lost their jobs as a result of foreign trade, is currently authorized through February 12, 2012. Congress significantly expanded the program as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in 2009 – including extending eligibility to service sector workers and nearly tripling the amount of funding available for training services – but these provisions were allowed to lapse earlier this year, and the program is now operating under pre-ARRA law.

According to materials just issued by the Senate Finance Committee, the compromise measure will, among other things:

• Reauthorize TAA through December 31, 2013, and retroactively extend expanded benefit eligibility to petitions filed on or after February 12 of this year;
• Provide $575 million for Fiscal Years (FY) 2012 and 2013, plus $143.75 million for the first quarter of FY 2014, to support job training, case management, and other activities;
• Restore eligibility for service sector workers; and
• Establish performance accountability measures for the program, including indicators relating to employment, earnings, and credential attainment for program participants.

The Finance Committee is scheduled to hold a ‘mock’ markup on the trade measures this Thursday (by law, Congress cannot amend trade agreements once submitted by the President, but can provide nonbinding recommendations to the administration prior to receiving the final agreements). National Skills Coalition will provide updates and in-depth analysis of the proposed legislation in the coming days. For the latest news, subscribe to NSC’s RSS feed, or follow us on Facebook and Twitter.