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The explicit assumption in most literature on educational and skill mismatches is that these mismatches are inherently costly for workers. However, the results in the literature on the effects of underqualification or underskilling on wages and job satisfaction only partly support this hypothesis. Rather than assuming that both skill surpluses and skill deficits are inherently costly for workers, we interpret these mixed findings by taking a learning perspective on skill mismatches. Following the theory of Vygotski on the so-called “zone of proximal development,” we expect that workers who start their job with a small skill deficit, show more skill growth than workers who start in a matching job or workers with a more severe skill deficit. We test this hypothesis using the Cedefop European skills and jobs survey (ESJS) and the results confirm these expectations. Workers learn more from job tasks that are more demanding than if they would work in a job that perfectly matches their initial skill level and this skill growth is largest for those who start with a small skill deficit. The learning opportunities are worst when workers start in a job for which they have a skill surplus. This is reflected in the type of learning activities that workers take up. Workers with a small skill deficit are more often engaged in informal learning activities. Finally, workers who started with a small skill deficit are no less satisfied with their job than workers who started in a well-matched job. We conclude that a skill match is good for workers, but a small skill deficit is even better. This puts some responsibility on employers to keep job tasks and responsibilities at a challenging level for their employees.

In our analyses, using data on Dutch tertiary education graduates, we use a direct measure for skills obsolescence based on workers' self-assessment. On average, almost a third of the skills obtained in tertiary education were obsolete seven years later. Skills obsolescence is strongly related to rapid changes in work domain, and to shortcomings in tertiary education. Obsolescence occurs as much in generic as in specific fields of study. It is only weakly related to current skill shortages, and not at all to the prospects for further skill acquisition, wages and investments in additional training.

This paper provides more insight into the assumption of human capital theory that the productivity of job-related training is driven by the improvement of workers’ skills. We analyze the extent to which training and informal learning on the job are related to employee skill development and consider the heterogeneity of this relationship with respect to workers’ skill mismatch at job entry. Using data from the 2014 European Skills and Jobs Survey, we find – as assumed by human capital theory – that employees who participated in training or informal learning show greater improvement of their skills than those who did not. The contribution of informal learning to employee skill development appears to be larger than that of training participation. Nevertheless, both forms of learning are shown to be complementary. This complementarity between training and informal learning is related to a significant additional improvement of workers’ skills. The skill development of workers who were initially underskilled for their job seems to benefit the most from both training and informal learning, whereas the skill development of those who were initially overskilled benefits the least. Work-related learning investments in the latter group seem to be more functional in offsetting skill depreciation than in fostering skill accumulation.

Suggests that youth unemployment is seen in East Germany as a critical life event because not only may it “scar” individuals’ careers but there is the fear that it may be a cause of other social problems such as criminal and racist behaviour. Bases the study on event‐history and optimal‐matching analysis. Considers seven hypotheses about the impact of unemployment on social mobility career transitions. Findings suggest that unemployment can raise those chances of upward, downward and lateral mobility.

In this chapter, we compare five approaches for assessing competences of higher education graduates. We begin by outlining the main reasons for assessing higher education graduates’ competences. Next, we present a brief definition of competences. This definition is applied throughout the chapter, and forms the framework for comparing various approaches for measuring higher education graduates’ competences, and for discussing their relative strengths and weaknesses. We conclude that the existing approaches for assessing competences are suitable for measuring only one type of competence, that is, either cognitive or non-cognitive, but limited in their capacities to measure both. In the context of changing labor market needs and requirements, it is essential either to use these approaches in combination or to develop innovative methods which are equally suitable for measuring discipline-related as well as more generic competences. In this chapter, we discuss the assessment approaches by mainly focusing on employment-related competences. By employment-related competences we mean both cognitive and non-cognitive aspects of competences, such as personal and social skills, leadership, and communication skills.

After decades of declining strike rates in the industrialized world, recent years have seen a surge of militant walkouts in the global South, political strikes in Europe, and unconventional strikes in nonunion sectors in the United States. This new diversity of strike action calls for a new theoretical framework. In this paper, we review the historical strengths and limits of traditions of strike theory in the United States. Building on the emerging power resources approach, we propose a model based on a multidimensional view of associational power, power resources, and arenas of conflict in the economy, state, and civil society. We demonstrate the utility of our approach via a case analysis of strikes in the “Fight for $15” campaign in the United States.

The purpose of this paper is to discover and develop the conceptual understanding of teaching and learning in entrepreneurship lecturers and how this is influencing the change in teaching experience.

The study was carried out among Estonian entrepreneurship lecturers who participated in a lecturer-training programme. A qualitative research method was adopted, focussing on thematic analysis. The framework for research and the analysis of results relied on the teaching and learning model, enabling the model to be tested in the context of entrepreneurship education.

The results show that the lecturers with learning-centred mind-sets tended to make changes in their teaching approaches and introduced changes in other teaching and learning components, such as the content (learning process) and outcomes of the learning subject. These inconsistent applications of changes justify the need for a systematic approach to entrepreneurship teaching and learning.

The results of the study contribute to a more systematic understanding of conceptions of teaching entrepreneurship among entrepreneurship lecturers, thereby allowing school management to understand the need for developing staff in addition to curricula. The study results are useful for informing training for entrepreneurship lecturers, designing entrepreneurship courses and choosing the appropriate methodology in such design.

This paper provides input for creating a conceptual teaching and learning model of entrepreneurship education that contributes to a more systematic understanding of the relationships between the components of teaching and learning when designing entrepreneurship education programmes. In the context of entrepreneurship education, the use of the teaching and learning model is required when considering the timeline between different components of the model. This means that it is important to first make decisions about the presage factors (including conceptual understanding of teachers), which provide the frame (context) for the teaching and learning process, as well as learning outcomes.