L&D 2020: Shaping change in learning
Society
Changing demographics
In January 2020 the Department for Work and Retirement published a report outlining the following UK trends1:
- workforce has grown by 600,000 since 2010. More than 60% of the growth has come from women entering the workforce, of whom 1 in 4 are mothers
- 3 workers to every non-worker, compared to a 4:1 ratio in 1990
- 16 million people in the UK aged 20-40 and 17 million between 45 and 65. In 2000 17 million people in the UK were aged 20-40 and 14 million between 45 and 65
- 10% of the workforce comes from ethnic minority groups
- 25% of families are single parent
- 10 million people have some responsibility in caring for elderly relatives.
Ethnic plurality is now commonplace. Around a dozen towns and cities in the UK will have no single ethnic group in a majority within the next 15 years. Leicester and Birmingham have already become the first 'super-diverse' cities, soon to be followed by Slough and Luton2. Leicester’s white population has fallen from 70 percent in 1991 to less than 45 percent today.
But immigrant and ethnic populations are no longer characterised by large, well organised Afro-Caribbean and South Asian communities. Instead, increasing numbers have arrived from all across the globe – from Mexico to Madeira and from Australia to Austria.
World population has grown more than expected earlier in the century, due to medical advances and longer life spans. Fertility in the developing world has continued to rise as has longevity in richer countries. These factors continue to contribute to a higher than expected rate of population growth. As a result, the UN has increased its forecast for global population from 9.1 billion people by 2050 to 9.2 billion3.
Currently, the large number of Baby Boomers is creating an ageing industrialized world. This trend is occurring across most of Europe and Japan. The USA is ageing the least rapidly because of its high immigration, both legal and illegal. This increasingly elderly population is putting enormous stress on social and economic systems worldwide – even worse in countries ageing faster, such as Japan and Italy.
Although Baby Boomers have reached retirement age, many continue to work – either through choice or the necessity of extra income to supplement inadequate pensions. Organisations have long been aware of the likely knowledge outflows once their boomers retired, many have still been caught out. Although technology has captured informational data, organisations have been slow to transfer key tacit knowledge. For those Boomers wishing to remain on the payroll, this is proving to be the ‘last laugh’ following years of downsizing in the 1980s and 1990s.
Forward-looking organisations were developing programmes and procedures to retain the knowledge of retiring Boomers from the late 1990s onwards. Many have alumni clubs that continue to tap the expertise of former employees –at both face-to-face events and virtually.
Young people are staying longer in education, partly to evade work responsibilities, and are leaving child rearing until later in life. Many are coming out of full-time education into what they consider to be temporary jobs while they save enough money to travel ‘before settling down’.
Many older people are taking advantage of their good health to enjoy a lengthy retirement. However, today’s local authorities, central government and other public bodies are constantly being taken to task by a well-educated and articulate grey population with the time to research and mobilise around issues of concern.
Healthcare has been transformed by biotech and genomics. People are living longer, healthier and more productive lives. The human enhancement marketplace, offering new organs, new memories, new limbs, new skin and new lives, has translated into the largest consumer market4.
1. Extrapolated from ‘Britain in 2010’, Department of Work and Pensions, 2001
2. http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2007/dec/23/communities.population 12/07
3. World Trends & Forecasts, Sep-Oct 2007
4. http://www.futureguru.com/10trends.php
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