As an Adelaide resume writer, I have strong and evidence-based research on the labour market. It’s gratifying to have someone in a senior research position agree with me.
Professor John Buchanan, a labour economist at the University of Sydney, said the ABS figures on unemployment and underemployment showed there was “no absolute shortage of labour”, though sometimes people needed training on the job.
Buchanan said for decades employers had engaged in employing the prime workforce of fit, healthy people in their late 20s and early 30s.
They also hired cheap overseas labour instead of older workers.
Brendan Coates, economic policy program director at the Grattan Institute, said skill shortages existed, but the term was overused.
“We should be fairly sceptical of claims of skills shortages because many are based on asking employers ‘can you find workers at the prevailing wage that you’re offering the staff?’,” Coates said.
“The obvious answer a lot of the time is that wages need to rise in order to attract workers from other sectors.”
The other reason employers say there are skills shortages was until recently, job seekers had to apply for 20 jobs a month to get the dole.
Employers were bombarded with applications for positions from people who had few, if any of the skills required.
National Seniors Australia is running a Let Pensioners Work! Campaign, pointing out that pensioners are discouraged from paid work because they lose 50c in the dollar once they earn more than the threshold, which recently increased to $190 a fortnight for singles and $336 a fortnight for couples.
In Australia, only 76,000 of the 2.6 million people on the age pension do any paid work.