Challenges Facing the European Union: Skillsand Training

Abstract

As recently as fifteen years ago, it was possible to divide Europe's training systems for intermediate skills (that is, for skilled blue-collar and non-professional white-collar employees) into two broad types. One was based on apprenticeship, whereby young workers ld undergo a period of supervised, employer-provided training combined with off-the-j ob training in vocational schools. The best-known example of this was in Germany, but it also existed in the other German-speaking areas of Western Europe and in the United Kingdom. The other model, more familiar to Americans, involved on-the-job training within enterprise internal l a bor markets, whereby workers-often with prior training in vocational school-learned the practical side of their profession alongside other employees. France provided a very good example of the latter. The main differences between the models lay in the degree of skill transferability ( high in the first case and much lower in the second) and in the degree of interemployer coordination required (again, high in the first case and lower in the second because apprenticeships certify skills as transferable, and in the internal labor market model important parts of the skills acquired are either specific to the firm or not certified, so they remain opaque to other employers ).