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The article comes out of the Australian press, but unless there's something truly unique about the Australian job market, it's almost certainly true elsewhere as well: a recent study shows more than half of young Australians are receiving college education to persue careers that will soon no longer exist. Thank robotics, industry consolidation, and the nature of the markets for the shrinking number of ways you will some day be able to earn a living.
There's a flip side to the debate, of course: there are certainly new things coming that haven't even been invented yet, that will provide job opportunities. But the trick is positioning yourself appropriately to take advantage of the new chances.
The not-for-profit group, which works with young Australians to create social change, says the national curriculum is stuck in the past and digital literacy, in particular, needs to be boosted. Foundation chief executive Jan Owen says young people are not prepared for a working life that could include five career changes and an average of 17 different jobs.
She says today's students will be affected by three key economic drivers: automation, globalisation and collaboration. "Many jobs and careers are disappearing because of automation," Ms Owen said. "The second driver is globalisation — a lot of different jobs that we're importing and exporting. And then thirdly collaboration which is all about this new sharing economy."
How does one future-proof his/her life and career?
Original Submission
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 28 2015, @07:24AM
They have had strong unions (yes unions are necessary, but they shouldn't have absolute power) for years and with the support of the govt they have a lot of industries ended up in dead ends - mining, car manufacturing to name two. This is only being exacerbated by the current Australian government. Not only has this lead people in to dead-end careers (that never the less paid very well while they were there) but has now dug Australia a huge hole (pardon the pun): mining ain't boom town anymore - digging up more minerals only serves to lower the bulk price (the current plan to save their economy.) Their hugely subsidized car manufacturing was so expensive that they couldn't even compete with imported vehicles that had massive duties slapped on them, and mining is fast following suit. The sooner governments stop propping up non-viable businesses, the better off (in the long term anyway) those countries will become. You can suffer a little at the beginning, or if you prop it up to the dire end and suffer massively when the correction hits. There is one thing for the capitalist ideal: if something goes up shit creek, those who have invested and work there are the ones who suffer. It isn't the governments job to prop up non-viable industries - either let some foolish investor do that or let the industry die. I might feel sorry for the workers, but not the investors.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 28 2015, @08:10AM
They have had strong overseas ownership (yes foreign investors are necessary, but they shouldn't have absolute power) for years and with the support of the govt they have a lot of industries ended up in dead ends - mining, car manufacturing to name two. This is only being exacerbated by the current Australian government.
FTFY
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday August 28 2015, @09:04AM
Bzzzzt... wrong.
Actually, there isn't any plan for saving anything but the foreskin of a small dhead between largish ears [quickmeme.com]. He's is so busy thumping his chest with the "we are the infrastructure govt" and "jobs and economy, mate" bricks that only the sound remains, in a surrealist melted suspension, a long time after the tree has fallen.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1) by caffeine on Friday August 28 2015, @09:49AM
A big problem with the car manufacturing industries was the high Australian dollar. They could never compete when the AU$ was higher than the US$. If you compare Australia's automotive subsidies of US$1966 per vehicle, to the USA's $2908 in per vehicle it does not really support the position of a hugely subsidized industry.
IMO, the way we got in this position was that for political reasons the government would rather have the young unemployed doing any studies rather than getting unemployment benefits. They really do not care about the future employment prospects of the students, they just want to claim a low unemployment rate.