Higher Ambitions in a Modern Labour MarketChallenges and opportunities

Alison WolfKing’s College London

Today’s World

• Huge expansion in education – in the developed world, full-time to 18 the norm, in developed and developing, very rapid growth in higher education

• Major changes in structure of labour market• In most developed countries, disappearance

of the youth labour market

Disappearance of the youth labour market for 16-18 year olds

Recent in the UK which maintained teenage employment at high levels longer

than most other European countries

Raising of participation age

But huge increases pre-dated this and reflect the labour market and

apprenticeship context

1985 1994 20100

100

200

300

400

500

600

FTE numbers of 16-18 year olds in schools plus FE colleges '000s

SchoolsFE colleges

Part-time education shrinks among the young

1985 1991 2000 20110

10

20

30

40

50

60

Percentage of 16-18 cohort in education

Part time FEFull time FEFull time schools

Best predictor of being in employment next year is being in employment this year

• Young people are always the ones who are most vulnerable to unemployment. Ratio of youth to adult unemployment is almost always large, though it varies among countries

• Getting the first job is critical• But problems for today’s young compounded not

only by shrinkage in ‘proper’ apprenticeships but also by shrinkage of the ‘Saturday job’

The ‘hourglass economy’• Post-war, huge increase in professional, managerial

and technical jobs. Growth has slowed enormously.• Huge productivity rises in manufacturing and services

have squeezed the number of skilled jobs in manual and white-collar middle ranks

• Big increase in numbers of low-paid service job, which require soft rather than technical skills

• However, these changes, while real, are ongoing, and do not particularly impact on the young rather than on older workers

Manufacturing as a share of GDP

1980 20090

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

FranceGermanyUK

The fastest-growing – and the largest growth

Conservation officers Town planners Paramedics Educational assistants Care assistants Marketing and sales managers

0

100000

200000

300000

400000

500000

600000

700000

800000

20012009

The case against the old vocational education regime

Why we needed (yet more) reforms in 2010

Stacking up qualifications

• Diverted resources – huge inefficiencies• Encouraged schools and colleges to steer

students into easy-to-pass awards• Discouraged resits of Mathe and English GCSE

(they might fail…)• Confused what government pays for with

what the labour market actually rewards• Had no ‘clear line of sight to work’

Priorities and the “Wolf Report” study programme

• Good Maths and English – used as filters for employers and also genuinely important in a very wide range of jobs. The labour market recognises these GCSEs. It does also reward actual skill in both.

• Qualifications that are substantive and recognised as such. (It would have been nice to avoid qualification reform for the nth time– but it is unavoidable.)

• Work experience: the hard part and truly vital. • And it can be done.

Apprenticeships in the UK

• The standard and single largest destination of school-leavers until the 1970s

• Attacked head-on in the 1980s• Re-embraced by government in the 1990s• BUT• Quality systematically undermined by targets,

funding regime, payment-by-results

The countries with the best record for youth employment and transitions are all countries with large apprenticeship systems:- but in each case, these have developed organically, without disruptions, and remained employer-owned.

We effectively destroyed the institutions which created and maintained apprenticeship and they will take years to re-established. However, ‘proper’ apprenticeships are highly desired and rightly so.

Although ‘top’ apprenticeship countries tend to have more manufacturing than the UK, the differences are not big: - labour market trends are general. These countries have also

a.Extended apprenticeship into non-traditional fieldsb.Included a major ‘general education’ component.

General education recognises (a) the changing nature of the labour market and the fact that many apprentices change sectors and (b) underpins progression

Current apprenticeship reforms return control to employers, and demand more substantive content and end-of-apprenticeship assessment of mastery – as do ‘top’ apprenticeship countries, and as we once did.

But this and future governments must hold their nerve. Unfortunately, the recent English ‘tradition’ is one of endless meddling and re-design.

In our favour…

• We have finally re-joined the rest of the developed world in extending demanding general education beyond 16

• Our universities are highly flexible in terms of entrance requirements and course design. (This is a mixed blessing, but means it is very easy for them to recognise and accept non-standard entry routes)

• There is general recognition, at least in 11-18 education, that numerical targets and payment by results drive down standards. We probably won’t make that mistake again for a while.

• We have a highly ‘wired’ society, in which young people of all classes are increasingly good at researching their options.

Plus every parent in Britain wants their child

to achieve…

Thank you