"Misalignment"

From the BBC:

The study, based on a survey of 11,000 13- to 16-year-olds, is an attempt to map the job ambitions of teenagers against the employment market up to 2020. It shows teenagers have a weak grasp of the availability of jobs - and that large numbers will be aiming for jobs that are in short supply. For instance, there are 10 times as many people aiming for jobs in the culture, media and sports sector than there are jobs likely to be available.(1)

And even though almost a quarter of jobs are in the distribution, hotels and restaurant category, only about one in 40 youngsters are considering careers in these industries.(2) Fewer than one in 30 young people are considering jobs in banking and finance, even though one in five jobs are expected to be in this sector.(3)

This "misalignment" could mean long-term problems for young people, the report says, because they are making decisions about qualifications and subjects with little awareness of the jobs market ahead of them.(4)

1) Yes, we covered that here.

2) Because they are not particularly glamourous and there's no hope of a superstar salary. But you do not need to dedicate ten or twenty years of your childhood, adolescence and early life to landing that dream job at McDonalds or UPS; if you fail to break into the hallowed ranks of pop stars, TV presenters, Premier League footballers etc despite your best efforts, then fair enough, you apply for a job in a shop or a café or a warehouse and work your way up. Hence and why I ended up as an accountant rather than Formula One racing driver or a record producer.

3) F-ing hell. There's your "misalignment" right there. Of course we need people to do the bookkeeping and run the banks' payments systems, this is all good stuff and the economy wouldn't function nearly as well without it, but it can't possibly required one person to do the bookkeeping or run the banks' payment systems for every four* people actually doing something useful, can it?

4) See 2). So what? You don't need to spend your whole adolescence building up skills, qualifications and contacts to break into the rarefied world of lorry drivers and hotel night managers.

* We could knock off a further % of people in public and private sector non-jobs to arrive at an even worse ratio, like one for every three and a half.