IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izapps/pp138.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Skills for the 21st Century: Findings and Policy Lessons from the OECD Survey of Adult Skills

Author

Listed:
  • Martin, John P.

    (University College Dublin)

Abstract

The OECD Survey of Adult Skills is the jewel in the crown of its Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC). This paper argues that the findings and policy lessons from the project to date justify the high hopes which were placed in PIAAC when detailed planning for the project began in 2003. First, it presents a brief recap of PIAAC and its two predecessor international skills surveys. Second, it outlines the main themes which have been investigated to date using data from PIAAC. Third, the main findings and policy lessons drawn from PIAAC are highlighted. Finally, looking forward to the second cycle of PIAAC, for which planning is now underway, the paper suggests some priority areas for improvements to the survey design in order to add to its analytical usefulness and enhance its utility to policy makers.

Suggested Citation

  • Martin, John P., 2018. "Skills for the 21st Century: Findings and Policy Lessons from the OECD Survey of Adult Skills," IZA Policy Papers 138, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izapps:pp138
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/pp138.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hanushek, Eric A. & Schwerdt, Guido & Wiederhold, Simon & Woessmann, Ludger, 2015. "Returns to skills around the world: Evidence from PIAAC," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 103-130.
    2. Stijn Broecke & Glenda Quintini & Marieke Vandeweyer, 2018. "Wage Inequality and Cognitive Skills: Reopening the Debate," NBER Chapters, in: Education, Skills, and Technical Change: Implications for Future US GDP Growth, pages 251-286, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Francesca Borgonovi & Artur Pokropek, 2016. "Education and Self-Reported Health: Evidence from 23 Countries on the Role of Years of Schooling, Cognitive Skills and Social Capital," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(2), pages 1-16, February.
    4. Eric A. Hanushek & Marc Piopiunik & Simon Wiederhold, 2019. "The Value of Smarter Teachers: International Evidence on Teacher Cognitive Skills and Student Performance," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 54(4), pages 857-899.
    5. Falck, Oliver & Heimisch-Roecker, Alexandra & Wiederhold, Simon, 2021. "Returns to ICT skills," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(7).
    6. William Thorn, 2009. "International Adult Literacy and Basic Skills Surveys in the OECD Region," OECD Education Working Papers 26, OECD Publishing.
    7. Marco Paccagnella, 2015. "Skills and Wage Inequality: Evidence from PIAAC," OECD Education Working Papers 114, OECD Publishing.
    8. Stijn Broecke, 2016. "Do skills matter for wage inequality?," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 232-232, February.
    9. McGuinness, Seamus & Pouliakas, Konstantinos & Redmond, Paul, 2017. "How Useful Is the Concept of Skills Mismatch?," IZA Discussion Papers 10786, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Acemoglu, Daron & Autor, David, 2011. "Skills, Tasks and Technologies: Implications for Employment and Earnings," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 12, pages 1043-1171, Elsevier.
    11. Garry Barrett & W. Craig Riddell, 2016. "Ageing and Literacy Skills: Evidence from IALS, ALL And PIAAC," OECD Education Working Papers 145, OECD Publishing.
    12. Melanie Arntz & Terry Gregory & Ulrich Zierahn, 2016. "The Risk of Automation for Jobs in OECD Countries: A Comparative Analysis," OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers 189, OECD Publishing.
    13. Glenda Quintini, 2014. "Skills at Work: How Skills and their Use Matter in the Labour Market," OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers 158, OECD Publishing.
    14. Frey, Carl Benedikt & Osborne, Michael A., 2017. "The future of employment: How susceptible are jobs to computerisation?," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 254-280.
    15. Marco Paccagnella, 2016. "Age, Ageing and Skills: Results from the Survey of Adult Skills," OECD Education Working Papers 132, OECD Publishing.
    16. Francis Green & Golo Henseke, 2016. "Should governments of OECD countries worry about graduate underemployment?," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 32(4), pages 514-537.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jacobs, Babs & van der Velden, Rolf, 2021. "Exploring the uncharted waters of educational mobility: The role of key skills," Research Memorandum 016, Maastricht University, Graduate School of Business and Economics (GSBE).
    2. Zupančič Magda, 2020. "Competency Management, Coordination and Responsibility in Slovenia," Naše gospodarstvo/Our economy, Sciendo, vol. 66(3), pages 36-47, September.
    3. Martin, John P., 2018. "Live Longer, Work Longer: The Changing Nature of the Labour Market for Older Workers in OECD Countries," IZA Discussion Papers 11510, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Maarten Goos & Melanie Arntz & Ulrich Zierahn & Terry Gregory & Stephanie Carretero Gomez & Ignacio Gonzalez Vazquez & Koen Jonkers, 2019. "The Impact of Technological Innovation on the Future of Work," JRC Working Papers on Labour, Education and Technology 2019-03, Joint Research Centre.
    5. Cervantes, Carla Varona & Cooper, Russell, 2022. "Labor market implications of education mismatch," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Tuomi, Aarni & Tussyadiah, Iis & Ling, Erin Chao & Miller, Graham & Lee, Geunhee, 2020. "x=(tourism_work) y=(sdg8) while y=true: automate(x)," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    2. Tommaso AGASISTI & Geraint JOHNES & Marco PACCAGNELLA, 2021. "Tasks, occupations and wages in OECD countries," International Labour Review, International Labour Organization, vol. 160(1), pages 85-112, March.
    3. Monika Köppl-turyna & Michael Christl, 2018. "Returns to Skills or Returns to Tasks? A Comment on Hanushek et al. (2015)," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 38(2), pages 783-790.
    4. Gries, Thomas & Naudé, Wim, 2020. "Artificial Intelligence, Income Distribution and Economic Growth," IZA Discussion Papers 13606, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Armanda Cetrulo & Dario Guarascio & Maria Enrica Virgillito, 2020. "Anatomy of the Italian occupational structure: concentrated power and distributed knowledge," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 29(6), pages 1345-1379.
    6. Montobbio, Fabio & Staccioli, Jacopo & Virgillito, Maria Enrica & Vivarelli, Marco, 2022. "Robots and the origin of their labour-saving impact," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 174(C).
    7. Thomsen, Stephan L, 2018. "Die Rolle der Computerisierung und Digitalisierung für Beschäftigung und Einkommen," Hannover Economic Papers (HEP) dp-645, Leibniz Universität Hannover, Wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Fakultät.
    8. Hensvik, Lena & Skans, Oskar Nordström, 2023. "The skill-specific impact of past and projected occupational decline," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    9. Fossen, Frank M. & Sorgner, Alina, 2021. "Digitalization of work and entry into entrepreneurship," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 548-563.
    10. Songul Tolan & Annarosa Pesole & Fernando Martinez-Plumed & Enrique Fernandez-Macias & José Hernandez-Orallo & Emilia Gomez, 2020. "Measuring the Occupational Impact of AI: Tasks, Cognitive Abilities and AI Benchmarks," JRC Working Papers on Labour, Education and Technology 2020-02, Joint Research Centre.
    11. Guendalina Anzolin, 2021. "Automation and its Employment Effects: A Literature Review of Automotive and Garment Sectors," JRC Working Papers on Labour, Education and Technology 2021-16, Joint Research Centre.
    12. Franziska Hampf & Ludger Woessmann, 2017. "Vocational vs. General Education and Employment over the Life Cycle: New Evidence from PIAAC," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 63(3), pages 255-269.
    13. Foster-McGregor, Neil & Nomaler, Önder & Verspagen, Bart, 2021. "Job Automation Risk, Economic Structure and Trade: a European Perspective," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(7).
    14. Brunello, Giorgio & Wruuck, Patricia, 2019. "Skill Shortages and Skill Mismatch in Europe: A Review of the Literature," IZA Discussion Papers 12346, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    15. Naude, Wim, 2019. "The race against the robots and the fallacy of the giant cheesecake: Immediate and imagined impacts of artificial intelligence," MERIT Working Papers 2019-005, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    16. Hong Cheng & Lukasz A. Drozd & Rahul Giri & Mathieu Taschereau-Dumouchel & Junjie Xia, 2021. "The Future of Labor: Automation and the Labor Share in the Second Machine Age," Working Papers 20-11, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    17. Arntz, Melanie & Gregory, Terry & Zierahn, Ulrich, 2019. "Digitalization and the Future of Work: Macroeconomic Consequences," IZA Discussion Papers 12428, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    18. Adamczyk, Willian Boschetti & Monasterio, Leonardo & Fochezatto, Adelar, 2021. "Automation in the future of public sector employment: the case of Brazilian Federal Government," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    19. Fossen, Frank M. & Sorgner, Alina, 2019. "New Digital Technologies and Heterogeneous Employment and Wage Dynamics in the United States: Evidence from Individual-Level Data," IZA Discussion Papers 12242, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    20. Arntz, Melanie & Gregory, Terry & Zierahn, Ulrich, 2016. "ELS issues in robotics and steps to consider them. Part 1: Robotics and employment. Consequences of robotics and technological change for the structure and level of employment," ZEW Expertises, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research, number 146501.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    PIAAC; skills; returns to skills; skills mismatch; skills use; lifelong learning;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality
    • I26 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Returns to Education
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • J62 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Job, Occupational and Intergenerational Mobility; Promotion
    • M53 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Personnel Economics - - - Training

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izapps:pp138. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.