Author: Duell, N.. in: Hogarth, T. (Ed), Economy, employment and skills: European, regional and global perspectives in an age of uncertainty, Fondazione Giaccomo Brodolini, Studi e Ricerche Series, Quaderni No 61, pp 209-236.
Publisher: Fondazione Giaccomo Brodolini
Year: 2018
Language: English
Are economies with a rapidly ageing workforce still equipped to master technological change and digitalisation? Will older workers will be left behind in the course of technical progress and finally be excluded from the labour market? The answer to these questions is not necessarily yes. The international comparison of ageing policies reveals that learning abilities arerelated to the accumulated human capital rather than age itself. Those at risk of low productivity performance are those workers who have a lowlevel of educational attainment and have not worked in an enriching work environment. These workers find themselves in a vicious circle of low productivity work with little access to the skills development.
Governments can do a lot to provide a robust base upon which skills development of older workers can flourish:
- systems for the recognition and validation of skills for older workers with low formal educational level but a wealthof work-experience and informal on-the-job learning,
- lifelong learning accounts who can improve the recognition of skills, lifelong vocational guidance can improve incentives for older workers to participate in further training.