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Ability Testing for Job Selection: Are the Economic Claims Justified?

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Test Policy and the Politics of Opportunity Allocation: The Workplace and the Law

Part of the book series: Evaluation in Education and Human Services ((EEHS,volume 22))

Abstract

As recently as 1973, the evidence on the ability of personnel tests to predict job performance was considered to be modest, at best (Ghiselli 1966,1973). Thus, it is rather astounding to find that by the early 1980s published research was arguing that the use of general ability tests to select workers could increase U.S. productivity by almost $90 billion (Hunter and Schmidt 1982, 268). A report prepared for the U.S. Employment Service estimated that if tests were given optimal use, the federal government could save about $16 billion each year and employers who hire through the U.S. Employment Service could save almost $80 billion each year (Hunter 1983a).

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Authors
  1. Henry M. Levin
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Graduate School of Education, University of California, Berkeley, USA

    Bernard R. Gifford

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© 1989 Kluwer Academic Publishers

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Levin, H.M. (1989). Ability Testing for Job Selection: Are the Economic Claims Justified?. In: Gifford, B.R. (eds) Test Policy and the Politics of Opportunity Allocation: The Workplace and the Law. Evaluation in Education and Human Services, vol 22. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2502-1_10

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2502-1_10

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-010-7629-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-009-2502-1

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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