Reimagining Workforce and Economic Development in the South

For decades, economic and workforce development systems have measured success primarily through job creation — the number of positions filled, the businesses recruited, the unemployment rate reduced. Yet for many workers, especially those in low-wage industries and economically distressed communities, job creation alone has not translated into economic security or mobility. More economic and workforce development leaders have begun to reckon with this gap, recognizing that traditional approaches are falling short — not for lack of effort, but because the systems were never fully designed with job quality as a goal.In response, a growing number of practitioners are experimenting with strategies that go beyond placement and retention to ask a more fundamental question: what makes a job worth having? Job quality strategies — which address wages, benefits, scheduling, worker voice, and pathways to advancement — are increasingly finding their way into the toolkits of a range of organizations. In this conversation, hosted by the Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program on April 1, 2026, we hear how the Institute’s Job Quality Fellows are embedding job quality into their work across a range of contexts and strategies — from employee ownership models that give workers a direct financial stake in their company's success, to apprenticeship programs that create structured pathways to higher-wage careers, to worker advisory committees that bring employee voice into business decision-making.Our speakers include Job Quality Fellows Kim Eckert (Craft Education / Western Governors University), Colby Hall (Craft Philanthropy), Daniel Marshall (Alabama Center for Employee Ownership / Ginkgo Bioworks, Inc.), Laurie Mays (Kentucky Chamber of Commerce Foundation), and moderator Matt Helmer (The Aspen Institute).For more information about this event, including a transcript, speaker bios, and additional resources, visit our website. For highlights from this discussion, subscribe to our YouTube channel.Or subscribe to our podcast to listen on the go.This event is part of our Job Quality in Practice series.