© 2005 CEIS, Fondazione Giacomo Brodolini and Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 9600 Garsington Rd., Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main St., Malden, MA 02148, USA. Comprehensive Education for the Unemployed — Evaluating the Effects on Unemployment of the Adult Education Initiative in Sweden Anders Stenberg Abstract. This paper evaluates the effects on unemployment in Sweden of the Adult Education Initiative (AEI) which during its run from 1997 to 2002 offered adult education to the unemployed at compulsory or upper secondary level. The AEI is compared with the vocational part of Labor Market Training (LMT) using unemployment incidence and unemployment duration as outcome variables, both measured immediately after completion of the programs. For unemployment inci- dence, selection on unobservables is taken into account by using a bivariate probit model. The analysis of unemployment duration considers both selection bias and censored observations. The results indicate lower incidence following participation in the AEI, but also — significant at the 10 per cent level — longer duration. 1. Introduction Swedish labor market policy has traditionally been characterized by measures that seek to activate the unemployed in some form of work-related training rather than merely handing out unemploy- ment benefits. The ambition has been to keep the labor force par- ticipation rate as high as possible during recessions and to avoid bottlenecks during periods of economic boom. On 1 July 1997 this strategy was boosted by the introduction of a large-scale project, Anders Stenberg, SOFI, Stockholm University, SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden. E-mail: anders.stenberg@sofi.su.se. The author wishes to thank Roger Axelsson, Kurt Brännäs, Xavier de Luna, Per Johansson, Olle Westerlund and Magnus Wikström, seminar participants at IFAU and an anonymous referee. Financial support from The Commission for Adult Education and Training is gratefully acknowledged. LABOUR 19 (1) 123–146 (2005) JEL J64