The 2014 Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act reshaped how the vocational rehabilitation system serves young people, requiring every state VR agency to set aside at least 15 percent of its federal funds for Pre-Employment Transition Services. It is the largest categorical youth-disability mandate in federal workforce policy, and this paper asks whether it moved employment.

Identification comes from cohort variation in who was age-eligible for Pre-ETS when the mandate took effect, combined with American Community Survey data. Youth just young enough to be covered are compared with slightly older peers who aged out, within the same period.

Eligibility narrowed the youth-disability employment gap by 2.5 percentage points, roughly 6.5 percent of the pre-WIOA gap, with gains concentrated among youth with cognitive disabilities. Notably, the effect does not track states’ discretionary Title I youth spending, pointing to the categorical Pre-ETS reserve itself as the active ingredient. The implied annual earnings gain approaches $2.9 billion.

• Pre-ETS eligibility raised youth employment.Age eligibility for Pre-Employment Transition Services reduced the pre-pandemic youth-disability employment gap by 2.5 percentage points, about 6.5 percent of the pre-WIOA gap.
• The gains concentrate among cognitive disabilities.Youth with cognitive disabilities account for most of the measured employment improvement.
• It is the mandate, not general spending.The effect does not scale with states’ discretionary Title I Youth spending, isolating the categorical Pre-ETS reserve as the operative policy.
• The dollar stakes are large.Implied earnings gains approach $2.9 billion per year.