Manufacturers push skills certificate as good jobs go unfilled-Miami Herald

"Five percent of manufacturing jobs go unfilled every day because we can't find the skilled workforce," fretted Jay Timmons, president of the National Association of Manufacturers. At any given time, this skills gap represents about 600,000 open jobs. That's a stark number given how much attention is focused on the high unemployment rate of 8.1 percent and weak monthly job numbers. The trade association, through its public-service group, the Manufacturing Institute, set a goal of 500,000 such certificates by 2016. The effort is an offshoot of the National Career Readiness Certificate created in 2006 by the workforce development non-profit group ACT to ensure sufficient math, reading and critical-thinking skills for future employees.