The Australian Institute of Company Directors’ deputy chairman, Gene Tilbrook, has used a roundtable forum to call for policymakers to do more to address the nation’s “emerging skills crisis”. Tilbrook argued that politicians are using the low unemployment rate as justification for overlooking the issue. From The Australian:
Leading company directors have demanded policymakers do more to address an emerging skills crisis in the Australian workforce, and urged business to play a far more active role in helping develop the workers of the future…
“When you talk about 5.7 per cent unemployment, it is really that and then 9 per cent underemployment. Some is people working two part-time jobs, neither of which are strong enough for them to ever get a bank loan. Or someone later in life who has been let go and is doing a bit of consulting. That is a significant area that I think is a signal that our policymakers are ducking the real issue here,’’ he said in a roundtable forum with The Australian hosted by the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
“Business can do things. There are things that educational organisations can do, but these are issues that need to be grasped as part of a national policy debate”…
Other business leaders in Australia, such as Seek chief executive Andrew Bassat, have urged companies to confront the serious implications of technology on the workforce of the future.
Mr Bassat has also urged policymakers and company boards to start a long-term discussion about what we will do if jobs disappear…
At least Tilbrook and his colleagues used the term “skills crisis” rather than “skills shortage”. Used in the context above, the former term infers there are surplus workers across the economy ill-equipped for rapid technological change, whereas the latter term – which is generally used by the business lobby to justify never-ending mass immigration – infers there are not enough workers across the economy.
We know that the whole “skills shortage” claim is bunk. The Department of Employment’s most recent skills shortages report told us so when it concluded that Australia’s skills shortage “remains low by historical standards”
Besides, if there was a general skills shortage, rather than too many workers, then why have median wages been stuck in a rut for so long? Why aren’t companies investing more in training and labour-saving equipment? Why aren’t they asking workers to work longer hours? It doesn’t add up.
Higher wages should drive productivity growth. But when firms are allowed to hire never-ending cheap labour from overseas, they have less incentive to train workers nor invest in productivity-enhancing labour saving technologies.
The truth is there are no widespread ‘labour shortages’. Just a shortage of ‘skilled’ people willing to work at low rates of pay, as well as a shortage of employers willing to employ and train locals for roles.
Policy makers concerned about poor wages growth and high underemployment should start by seeking to raise the pay floor on temporary skilled workers from the appallingly low level of $53,900 (non-indexed), as well as closing all the other loopholes facilitating widespread rorting of temporary foreign workers.
