Lynch, Lisa M. --- "Investments in Adult Lifelong Learning" [2009] ELECD 406; in Dau-Schmidt, G. Kenneth; Harris, D. Seth; Lobel, Orly (eds), "Labor and Employment Law and Economics" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2009)

Book Title: Labor and Employment Law and Economics

Editor(s): Dau-Schmidt, G. Kenneth; Harris, D. Seth; Lobel, Orly

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9781847207296

Section: Chapter 4

Section Title: Investments in Adult Lifelong Learning

Author(s): Lynch, Lisa M.

Number of pages: 19

Extract:

4 Investments in adult lifelong learning
Lisa M. Lynch


1 Introduction
Over the past 25 years workers with substantial amounts of human capital
in the form of education and training have been better able to survive the
labor market challenges of technological innovation and globalization
and have seen their earnings rise. In addition, as shown in Bresnahan
et al. (2002), Black and Lynch (1996, 2004) and Lynch (2007), business
investments in information and communication technologies have com-
plemented investments in human capital and employers who have made
these types of investments have experienced higher productivity. However,
in spite of the growing rewards to skills, we see in many advanced indus-
trialized economies that the supply of skilled workers does not seem to
be keeping pace with the pressures of technological innovation and an
increasingly international labor market. Policy responses to a growing
skills shortage include improving the skills of new entrants to the labor
market or changing immigration policy to increase the supply of skilled
workers.
Reliance on changes in immigration policy to increase the stock of
skilled workers often encounters considerable political resistance. In addi-
tion, just focusing on increasing the schooling experience of new entrant
workers will not be enough to meet the human capital needs of a workforce
that is also aging. For example, in the US the median age of the workforce
is projected to be 42 by 2020, so most workers will have long since com-
pleted their formal education. Therefore, investments in human capital
...