The skills taught by an educational system may not match the skills employers are looking for and need. That can take a toll on employee productivity, wages as well as the economic performance of a country. However, is the difference between skills supplied and demand for skills in the Czech Republic as abysmal as we think? The fact is that the skills required by the labor market are basically in balance with those we learn at school.
These are the findings of a study entitled Skills mismatches in the Czech Republic produced by the IDEA think tank at CERGE-EI (Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education), a joint workplace of Charles University in Prague and the Economics Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences. The study is based on 1994-2014 data from the Labour Force Survey of the Czech Statistical Office.
Low unemployment among graduates
"The educational structure of the Czech population shows notable increase in the educational attainment over the past twenty years," says the study author Klara Kalíšková. The proportion of a university-educated population has more than doubled (from 9% in 1994 to 20% in 2014). At the same time, the half of the population with only primary education has decreased (from 15% in 1994 to 7% in 2014). The growth in the number of educated people has, however, not deteriorated the employability of graduates.
New graduates had studied in mainly technical majors, pedagogy, economics, and medicine. Secondary school graduates had studied mainly technical majors, wholesale and retail trade, hospitality and restaurant services and textile production. Graduates of these fields of study have one of the lowest unemployment rates as the number of graduates does not exceed the demand in the labor market.
In comparison with other EU countries, the unemployment rate of graduates in the Czech Republic is consistently low. A high unemployment rate affects only a small group of people with only a primary education.
Low over-qualification
Another indicator which shows mismatches in the skills offered and required in the labor market is the number of overqualified people. The study showed that over-qualification in the Czech Republic is low.
"Overall, about one-fifth of the Czech population finds themselves subjectively overeducated for their current job, while the objective and empirical indicators define as overeducated only 12 and 8% of the working population, respectively," notes the author. This number is very low compared with other countries.
The complete study is available online here.
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