Too many jobs require virtually no education
Should you wish to know the best way to carry a hot coffee or avoid backache, Britain’s employers have you covered. But set your sights a bit higher than health-and-safety briefings—on courses that risk making you better at your job, say—and the chance of disappointment soars.
According to data from Eurostat, the EU’s statistics agency, British firms spend only half as much on training per employee as European ones. They train fewer workers, and give each of them less time in class. Most of these metrics are going backwards. The Learning and Work Institute, a think-tank, reckons that in 2019 bosses in Britain spent 28% less in real terms training workers than they did in 2005 (while spending in Europe went up).
