Relative Supply of Skilled Labor
Education is an important factor in increasing skill level. The increase in number of people attending high schools and colleges contribute to the increase in the supply of skilled labor. Mass education, however, is not the only factor. Immigration is also a big contributor. Immigrants created a bimodal skill distribution, where most immigrants were either low skill or high skill workers. There were few who were in between.
Historical Reference - In the United States such factors have caused an overall increase in the supply of skilled labor during the 20th century. The shift from unskilled to skilled labor can be attributed to increases in human capital, or in other words increasing the efficiency of humans through investment in knowledge. The American boom in public education, specifically high schools, congruently increased the level of human capital and total factor productivity.
Read more about this topic: Skill (labor)
Famous quotes containing the words relative, supply, skilled and/or labor:
“It is an interesting question how far men would retain their relative rank if they were divested of their clothes.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The job of the press is to encourage debate, not to supply the public with information.”
—Christopher Lasch (b. 1932)
“As they move into sharing parenting, men often are apprentices to women because they are not yet as skilled in child care. Mothers have to be willing to teach fathers—both by stepping in and showing and by stepping back and letting them learn.”
—Nancy Press Hawley. Ourselves and Our Children, by Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, ch. 6 (1978)
“Like speaks to like only; labor to labor, philosophy to philosophy, criticism to criticism, poetry to poetry. Literature speaks how much still to the past, how little to the future, how much to the East, how little to the West.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)