BRIGHT go-ahead graduates are more likely to find high-quality, well-paid jobs in the public sector than big business.
No, not some Utopian fantasy but reality for graduate jobseekers in some areas of Britain, according to the research and strategy consultancy the Local Futures Group. The milk round may never be the same again.
From Exeter to Aberdeen, graduates are more likely to seek employment in education, health or social work than manufacturing, banking or management consultancy.
There are sharp regional variations, though, with 69 per cent of “knowledge intensive” jobs in Lincolnshire provided by the public sector compared with just 23 per cent in East London. In the capital there are wide variations between boroughs with graduates more likely to be employed in the public sector in Greenwich than Tower Hamlets.
The public sector is propping up the economy in some rural and post-industrial areas of Britain. “In many areas of the country, outside London especially, the public sector is a major generator of knowledge-intensive and better paid job opportunities — especially jobs for graduates,” according to the report authors.
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“It could be described as ‘accidental Keynesianism’ with the public sector keeping the economy’s job-generation capacity going in the absence of powerful business drivers,” they say.
As a result public sector reforms could have a greater impact on the economy than attempts to create a new entrepreneurial culture.
The phenomenon also raises important questions about the public sector as an employer and trainer, employee skills mixes and labour flexibility and mobility especially between sectors.
www.localfutures.com