Tens of thousands of young people have by now switched to back-to-school mode. Most parents will be relieved to settle back in the winter routine after the long hot summer. Others with older children fret about the choices their sons and daughters make as they start university life.
A generation or two ago it was relatively easy for parents to advise their children on what tertiary education courses they should follow. Medicine, law and architecture were the preferred options for the more ambitious as it was perceived that these professions guaranteed a lifelong lifestyle characterised by job satisfaction and good remuneration.
In more recent years, accountancy and business studies have increased in popularity and are perhaps even less strenuous than the traditional professions. Yet many young people still want to pursue their dreams. They opt for studies in more exotic fields like psychology, archaeology or European Studies.
Whether we admit or not, the choice of studies that young people make will affect their lifestyles when they complete their tertiary education. Parents will do well to listen not so much to politicians who are not renowned for straight talk, but to experts with a vision on how the labour market is likely to evolve in the next decade and beyond.
Two significant recent events indicate what today’s youngsters are likely to face when it is time for them to start a career. Mark Carney, the governor of the Bank of England made a fascinating speech to the Bank of Ireland that got the attention of the British media. One of the more startling predictions made by Carney is that quite soon retirement will be consigned to history as workers stay in their jobs for their entire lives.
The Fourth Industrial Evolution that has already begun, even if few define recent economic developments by this term, will mean that workers will need to continue with their education and training in later life. As new technology comes on stream those who are not retrained will become unemployed and dependant on social benefits.
Our educational achievement levels still lag behind those of other EU countries
Carney remarked: “Unlike in the previous industrial revolutions, the more rapid pace of adjustment and longer working lives means workers may not have the option of retiring. This raises risks of substantial skills mismatch, leading to increased structural unemployment and adverse macroeconomic outcomes”. A shrinking working population in most EU countries will speed up this phenomenon.
The big issue for education policymakers will be how to institutionalise retraining in mid-careers and to integrate it with the social welfare system. Malta will have an even more significant challenge as our educational achievement levels still lag behind those of other EU countries.
At the same time that Carney made these predictions, the World Economic Forum issued its latest Future of Jobs report. This year’s report confirmed the trends identified in previous reports. According to the WEF, artificial intelligence and robots will kill off 75 million jobs worldwide by 2022. It also warns that humans will have to revamp skills to keep pace with the seismic shift in how we work with machines.
The 2018 report foresees robots swiftly replacing humans in the accounting, client management, industrial, postal and secretarial sectors. Jobs that require ‘human skills’ like sales, marketing and customer service should see demand increase, along with jobs relating to e-commerce and social media.
Like Carney, the WEF report emphasises the importance of creativity, critical thinking, and persuasion that need to be hardwired in all educational systems. The good news is that 133 million new jobs are expected to be created by 2022 as a result of this Fourth Industrial Revolution.
These developments are already affecting most Western societies as millions of displaced workers see no inspiration from their traditional political leaders. Tomorrow’s political leaders need to spend less time waxing lyrical about their mediocre successes, tweeting to an audience that is fed up with political narcissism, and giving the impression that they are in politics to better the lives of ordinary people.
Reskilling workers, enabling remote employment and building safety nets for displaced employees is a tall order for both business and political leaders. Such an essential list of priorities requires inspirational political leaders who look beyond their likely term of office and focus on how best to prepare younger people for the workplace in the next decade and beyond.
Younger people should also need to follow closely how the world of business is changing, and the likely effect that these changes will have on their lives.
johncassarwhite@yahoo.com