Page 44 - IDEA Study 3 2018 Low skilled

contributions that demotivate employers to hire low-skilled individuals on a standard employment contract. The low-skilled are thus very often employed on temporary contracts or so called “dohoda” (one-off job agreements), which are subject to lower taxation. Consequently, the low-skilled have much shorter job tenure, face worse career prospects, and are rarely offered any training by their employers. The question therefore arises as to how we can ensure that the low-skilled have better jobs and do not re-enter unemployment. The situation of the employed low-skilled could be improved by additional incentives provided to employers to offer the low-skilled long- term contracts and invest in their skills via on-the-job training. However, there is evidence that some of the low-skilled are not attractive to private employers even when partly covered by the state subsidy (Horáková, 2017), in which case the above-mentioned incentives might not be enough to improve the career prospects of the low-skilled. Rather, the lack of relevant skills that would be valued in the labor market seems to be the main barrier for the low-skilled to enter employment with reasonable long-term prospects. We have shown that a very high share of the low-skilled work in Elementary Occupations, which require only the most basic skills. However, almost 40% of the low-skilled employees work as Plant and Machine Operators and Assemblers, an occupation with relatively high pay, which requires specific skills and offers reasonable labor market prospects. This suggests that the acquisition of relevant labor market skills can, to a certain extent, compensate for the low level of skills acquired via formal education. The upskilling of the low-skilled (i.e. acquiring labor market relevant skills and competencies via lifelong and adult learning) seems, therefore, the main long-term solution to improving the position of the low-skilled. The relevant policies, however, must consider the incentives of all the relevant parties: motivate low-skilled individuals to participate in lifelong learning, motivate employers to recognize the value of lifelong learning, and ensure efficiency of the lifelong learning providers. 42