Do employees with Flexible Contracts receive less Training?

For the growing group of flexible workers, further investments in their human capital are even more important than for employees with permanent contracts, because the labour market position of flexible workers is continuously at risk. In this paper, we analyse the participation rate of flexible employees in company training. We will simultaneously estimate the determinants of receiving continuing vocational training and the duration of this training in a sample selection model. The estimation results indicate that flexible employees receive about half as much training with the current employer than permanent employees. A Blinder-like decomposition analysis shows that 40% of this difference is due to the fact that employers are more willing to invest in the human capital of permanent employees. However, flexible workers who do get training participate in training of at least the same duration as that of the permanent employees.education, training and the labour market;

Beyond Manpower Planning: ROA's Labour Market Model and its Forecasts to 2002

This paper describes the forecasting model of the Research Centre for Education and the Labour Market (ROA), which has been developed for making forecasts about developments of the labour market position of different types of education with respect to the Dutch labour market. Every two years, ROA compiles forecasts of changes in the labour market in the medium term, differentiated by a large number of economic sectors, occupational classes and types of education to illustrate the meaning of the information. The paper aims particularly to describe the objectives, the basic principles, the theoretical foundations and the structure of ROA''s forecasting approach and the major labour market indicators in more detail. The forecast labour market developments for the types of education up to the year 2002 will also be presented. Due to the low level of aggregation used, these forecasts provide very useful information for people who are involved in decisions about educational investments.education, training and the labour market;

Upgrading in the European Union

Human capital factor endowments have become one of the main determinants of international competitiveness. Both to catch up in the technological race and to increase the long-term flexibility of the workforce, industrialized countries require a highly skilled labour force. This paper analyzes the skills upgrading process in the European Union, as reflected in shifts in the occupational structure of employment and changes in the skill requirements in the various occupational fields. We distinguish between upgrading by recruitment policies and by training policies. Labour Force Survey data shows an increase in skill levels and rather stable participation in continuing vocational education. The data also reveal diverging trends, in the period 1983- 1991, between the various Member States of the European Union, both with regard to the skill level of the working population and the rate of participation in training activities. Estimation results show that, in general, intermediate skilled workers participate more in training activities than highly skilled workers. This suggests some substitutability between initial education (i.e. recruitment policies) and continuing training. However, if we correct for the occupational field in which workers are employed, recruitment policies and training policies appear to be complementary rather than substitutes. This means that within the various occupational fields, continuing training increases the skill gap between highly skilled and intermediately skilled workers. Moreover, both intermediate and highly skilled workers participate significantly more in continuing training than low skilled workers. This again indicates an increase in the skill gap in the labour force in the EU Member States, which means that continuing training fails to achieve the upgrading of low skilled workers which is required if the labour supply is to be adjusted to transfer human resources towards activities which match the EU''s comparative advantages.education, training and the labour market;

Forecasting the Labour Markets for Research Scientsits and Engineers in the European Union

The aim of this study is to assess whether the higher education systems in the Member States of the European Union will produce sufficient numbers of science & technology (S&T) graduates to meet the demands for research scientists and engineers (RSE’s) up to 2002. On the demand side, we distinguish between job openings due to employment growth (expansion demand) and due to outflow (replacement demand). Employment of RSE’s is modelled as an error correction mechanism with R&D expenditure as the explanatory variable. A recent survey of European R&D establishments enables us to determine replacement demand. On the supply side, the labour market inflow of RSE’s is derived from data on S&T-graduates and RSE employment. We produce forecasts for demand and supply for 14 Member States of the EU under four alternative scenarios, which are based on two dimensions: economic growth and human capital policy. The forecasts are first used to identify labour market discrepancies by country and by field of study. Then we identify the opportunities for international labour mobility to solve the bottlenecks in the labour markets. The forecasting results indicate considerable shortages of RSE’s in certain fields of study in various Member States of the EU under certain scenarios. At the same time, for the EU as a whole there are excess supplies in each of the four fields of study distinguished, no matter which scenario will unfold up to 2002, illustrating the importance of international labour mobility.education, training and the labour market;