Getting Skills Right: Sweden
The costs of a persistent misalignment between the supply and demand for skills are substantial, ranging from lost wages for workers to lower productivity for firms and countries. Addressing skills imbalances has become even more of a concern as OECD governments reflect on the implications of technological progress, digitisation, demographic change and globalisation for jobs and work organisation. In light of these challenges, OECD has undertaken new research to shed light on how countries measure changing skill needs while ensuring that employment, training and migration institutions are responsive to the emergence of new skill requirements. The Getting Skills Right in Sweden review offers an in-depth analysis of the key areas where policy action is required to spur the development of an efficient system for skills assessment and anticipation to inform policy in the country. The report provides an assessment of practices in the following areas: i) the collection of information on existing and future skill needs; ii) the use of skill needs information to guide policy development in the areas of labour, education and migration; and iii) the existence of effective governance arrangements to ensure good co-ordination among the key stakeholders in the collection and use of skill needs information.
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Assessment and recommendations
According to the OECD Survey of Adult Skills 34% of workers in Sweden are employed in a field which is not related to their studies (e.g. field of study mismatch) and 39% are mismatched by qualifications (i.e. having either higher or lower education than required by their jobs). Around 11% of workers are mismatched by skills, being either more or less proficient in literacy than what is required by their job. Despite overqualification and over-skilling being an issue in Sweden, around 33% of firms claim to face difficulties in filling their vacancies due to the lack of workers with adequate skills. Wage pressures are also emerging in sectors requiring high skills. In parallel, the integration of migrants and asylum seekers’ skills poses fundamental challenges in terms of adapting these skills to Sweden’s knowledge intensive labour market.
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