Skills shortages impact teachers and tradies

What are the jobs of the future? Jobs are going begging in teaching, aged care and the trades, the first report from Jobs and Skills Australia reveals.

Every job in the construction industry has a skills shortage. Picture: istock.

Australia must find 81,600 more teachers and 11,700 extra childcare workers within five years, Jobs and Skills Australia has revealed in the first official assessment of staff shortages in education.

Skills shortages across the economy have almost doubled in the past two years, with 36 per cent of occupations short of workers this year, compared with 19 per cent in 2021.

“Australia faces a skills challenge not seen since the 1960s,’’ Jobs and Skills Australia states in its first annual report, released on Wednesday.

Staff shortages now affect half of all trades occupations, and every job in the construction and food industries.

Aged and disability care, retail management and teaching are the three most in-demand jobs this year.

Solicitors, taxation accountants, biomedical engineers and sales and marketing managers joined the list of skills shortages for the first time this year.

Employers are relying more on migrants to fill jobs, with a record one in three workers born overseas – including two-thirds of software programmers.

Despite crippling staff short­ages, just one in 100 employers offered higher wages to attract staff this year, Job and Skills Australia found.

“Some shortages may be resulting from employers not making the job offer sufficiently attractive, including through higher wages,’’ the Jobs and Skills Australia report states.

“Wages growth was lower than might have been expected in the lead-up to the Covid-19 pandemic and has not responded as quickly as expected to the tight labour market since.

Explanations for this relatively sluggish wage growth include overall weak productivity growth and reduced dynamism in the labour and product ­markets.’’

Jobs and Skills Australia commissioned Victoria University to calculate workforce requirements over the next five and 10 years. It predicted the care and support workforce would need 145,000 more workers by 2033 – up 22 per cent from existing ­levels.

“Common reasons for filling jobs in this sector include lack of competitive wages, perceptions that there are not clear pathways for careers progression, and concerns that workloads are too high,’’ the report says.

The report predicts Australia would require 81,600 more workers in the education and training sector – predominantly teachers in schools and TAFE, along with university staff – over the next five years, with an extra 156,000 more required in a decade.

Australia will also needs 80,500 more nurses, 86,500 more aged and disabled carers and 21,200 extra electricians by 2033.

Childcare centres will need to hire 11,700 extra staff over the next five years, and 31,000 more over a decade.

The report says occupations with skills shortages all require “high levels of skills, qualifications and experience’’.

“When it comes to work in the care and support sectors, the core tasks are also unlikely to be automated in the foreseeable future, while the demand for health and care workers is likely to only increase,’’ it says.

But it says employers may need to make jobs more attractive, through higher wages or more flexible work.

It blames “burnout’’ from the Covid-19 pandemic for a shortage of nurses, with the health sector relying heavily on nurses trained overseas.

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) said the report showed the need for greater taxpayer support for businesses to take on apprentices.

It wants wage subsidies of 30 per cent in the first year of an apprenticeship, with payments of $2500 to employers and $5000 to apprentices as incentives to finish their training.

“This would empower young Australians to embark on their careers and contribute to the nation’s skilled workforce,’’ ACCI chief executive Andrew McKellar said.

“The apprenticeship model plays a vital role in skills development and successful transitions from education to employment.

“To ensure that job seekers possess the skills and training required for the jobs of today and tomorrow, we must get the incentives right.’’

Business Council of Australia chief executive Bran Black called for better integration of university and vocational education, along with the expansion of short-course “microcredentials’’ to upskill workers.

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