NBR Commentary – Workforce Education – 15 Feb 07
This week’s Nightly Business Report series on “changing demographics” reminds me that one variableisn’t changing fast enough – the educational attainment of the American workforce. Yes, we are among the most educated nations. But we also have a very high-tech, information-based economy, and education and training aren’t keeping pace with the requirements of today’s jobs.
Aggregate demand for less skilled labor is almost flat. The net additions to the job mix are almost all on the skilled side. About two-thirds of these new jobs call for a college degree, the rest for extensive, often technical, training. But only about 35% of Americans earn college degrees, and only 30% earn them by age 30. In five years, the workforce is projected to be over 6 million degree holders short, with the biggest gaps in engineering disciplines. Meanwhile, many of these jobs are portable, and there are plenty of educated people around the world happy to fill them.
The shortfall isn’t just in higher education. Virtually all jobs these days call for increasing analytical, technical, and communication skills – at levels that too many high school graduates lack.
What to do? Invest seriously in public education, but that does employers little good in the short term. Employers who are unable or disinclined to outsource work elsewhere have to be in the education business themselves as never before – all the way from remedial skills training to big incentives for employees to pursue undergrad and graduate education.
I’m Robert Morison.
This week’s Nightly Business Report series on “changing demographics” reminds me that one variableisn’t changing fast enough – the educational attainment of the American workforce. Yes, we are among the most educated nations. But we also have a very high-tech, information-based economy, and education and training aren’t keeping pace with the requirements of today’s jobs.
Aggregate demand for less skilled labor is almost flat. The net additions to the job mix are almost all on the skilled side. About two-thirds of these new jobs call for a college degree, the rest for extensive, often technical, training. But only about 35% of Americans earn college degrees, and only 30% earn them by age 30. In five years, the workforce is projected to be over 6 million degree holders short, with the biggest gaps in engineering disciplines. Meanwhile, many of these jobs are portable, and there are plenty of educated people around the world happy to fill them.
The shortfall isn’t just in higher education. Virtually all jobs these days call for increasing analytical, technical, and communication skills – at levels that too many high school graduates lack.
What to do? Invest seriously in public education, but that does employers little good in the short term. Employers who are unable or disinclined to outsource work elsewhere have to be in the education business themselves as never before – all the way from remedial skills training to big incentives for employees to pursue undergrad and graduate education.
I’m Robert Morison.
