Jobs

misskool

from the link above,

Moreover, with the government’s plans of spending cuts continuing, 100,000 public sector jobs will go. The private sector is expected to create about 200,000 new positions, but these gains will be nullified by matching unemployment figures.

hmmm...

Wookster

misskool wrote: »

Universities will happily focus on home-grown students if the government will support them. There are specific caps for each university and you get fined if you go over.

And with the uncertainty of higher education funding with higher fees..
Government’s sums must be right…or else, says Hefce head

Lots of things rumbling on unhappily in UK HE at the moment, it's definitely not as simple as stop the students.

I think Macque is right.

The problem is education and aspiration. I don't believe quality university will make a difference unless people are leaving school with solid skills (i.e. literacy & numeracy) and aspiration and the belief that hard work will lead to a better life.

misskool

Wookster wrote: »

I think Macque is right.

The problem is education and aspiration. I don't believe quality university will make a difference unless people are leaving school with solid skills (i.e. literacy & numeracy) and aspiration and the belief that hard work will lead to a better life.

Of course! Absolutely agree that youngsters in the UK now need to understand that not all of them will be winners in XFactor, the Voice, Britain's Got Talent and will have a guaranteed income from working the media.

The problem is the media is saturated with celebrities or WAGs that spend money but don't have an actual talent flashing their cash.

Better role models are needed and being a good hardworking honest person needs to be the norm rather than the exception, shouldn't it?

However, the solution is not as easy as what he is implying, that by stopping all non-EU students the universities will automatically start training more home students. I merely pointed out that the main reason universities don't train more home students is that the government caps their places.

kabayiri

Do we want to sustain large numbers of economically inactive people is to me the question.

It doesn't really matter how we arrive at those large numbers. Today it may be due to economic migrants, tomorrow it might be due to much greater automation in the workplace.

The end effect is the same.

I think our workplace model is based on something fitting 50 or a 100 years ago. This notion of full time employment / job for life / pension based on salary may not be the right one going forward.

Shouldn't we be more flexible about part time jobs / multiple jobs / combination of employed and self-employed.

I read a book about this called The Age of Unreason by Charles Handy where he challenged the work balance model. This book is a good 20+ years old now, but I suspect if he did a review he would find nothing substantive has changed.

vivatifosi

kabayiri wrote: »

Do we want to sustain large numbers of economically inactive people is to me the question.

It doesn't really matter how we arrive at those large numbers. Today it may be due to economic migrants, tomorrow it might be due to much greater automation in the workplace.

The end effect is the same.

I think our workplace model is based on something fitting 50 or a 100 years ago. This notion of full time employment / job for life / pension based on salary may not be the right one going forward.

Shouldn't we be more flexible about part time jobs / multiple jobs / combination of employed and self-employed.

I read a book about this called The Age of Unreason by Charles Handy where he challenged the work balance model. This book is a good 20+ years old now, but I suspect if he did a review he would find nothing substantive has changed.

I agree that it is outmoded, but it is very slow changing. I've mentioned before that I follow the Handy model and have five jobs as a portfolio worker, though I'll shortly be dropping one. It works for me, I can be an entrepreneur while having the security of a salary, but I know very few other people who do it. One big drawback though is firms still tend to make the majority of their well paid jobs full-time. At the top end you have non-execs working for a number of companies and at the bottom end there is low-paid part time work. There is very little in the middle and possibly diminishing, as one of the rare places such jobs existed in the past is the public sector.

I don't know what the answer is, but agree that having a large number of unemployed while importing people to do low-skill, low-wage jobs does seem crazy.

kabayiri

vivatifosi wrote: »

...
I don't know what the answer is, but agree that having a large number of unemployed while importing people to do low-skill, low-wage jobs does seem crazy.

'Crazy' is one way of putting it.

'Unsustainable' is one I would use.

I'm also curious about this claim that immigrants automatically bring in skills we don't have here.

I had some Polish builders offer to quote for an extension on my house. It was a 'no thanks' because I personally won't entertain any high value work being done by someone who isn't guaranteed to be around for the long term.

Low value things like laying flags or mowing lawns I might entertain. These things are skills which every country has. It perhaps becomes an issue of price.

Wookster

vivatifosi wrote: »

I don't know what the answer is, but agree that having a large number of unemployed while importing people to do low-skill, low-wage jobs does seem crazy.

For sure.

Problem is that a great element of these folks expect decent paying jobs right near home. Say anything to the effect of 'On your bike' and you'll hear cries of Tebbit returns.

As far as I'm concerned, if you can support yourself you get to make all your own choices but if you are reliant on state support you lose that privilege.

macaque_2

ruggedtoast wrote: »

Oh look, an ignorant post about immigration stepped in small minded Daily Mail bigotry on the MSE Debate board, again.

When the subject of immigration arises, it seems inevitable that one or two thought police will move in and try to shut down the debate with insults and denigrating language.

An alarmingly high proportion of young people in this country are unemployed. The plight of young black males is even more serious with 50% unemployed. Of those who have jobs, many are on minimum wages with no career prospects.

How would you feel if you were at the bottom of the job pile and opened a newspaper, to read that the UK needs an open borders policy to bring in the right skills. If it was me, I would want to know why I had not been given 'the right skills'.

Do we need mass immigration because millions of young people in the UK are congenital idiots or because they have been badly prepared for working life. You tell me!

P.S. And until we stop mass immigration (no problem with small immigration) we will never create the incentives for schools and employers to invest in the human potential on our own doorstep.

PaulF81

its quite simple. If british people want British jobs, they need to work harder at school. Rather having rants on the daily mail, perhaps they should be brushing up on the skills and attitudes that make immigrants so employable.

macaque_2

PaulF81 wrote: »

its quite simple. If british people want British jobs, they need to work harder at school. Rather having rants on the daily mail, perhaps they should be brushing up on the skills and attitudes that make immigrants so employable.

I agree that young people need to work hard (and also need to learn respect and good manners), but the way they are is not their fault. Most young people are by default lazy and selfish. They mature through good example, discipline and support from older people. The state however has become so unfriendly towards good institutions like marriage, the Church and parental rights that many parents have simply abdicated responsibility. We now have generations of young people being brought up by people who never matured themselves (10,000 young were taken into care last year).

It is never too late to put things right. We need more male teachers and less child rearing by state dictat. Parents who pick vexatious arguments with teachers or go to lawyers about school uniforms should be made to do community service.

As for people who have left school, employers have a self interest and social duty to help repair the damage. And supermarkets that go to east Europe to find trainee managers for UK stores should be fined 10% of their turnover.