The complementary Labour Market Pressure for Skills-First Approaches Index captures the extent to which a country could benefit from stronger skills-first policies. While it does not feed into the calculation of the main Skills-First Readiness and Adoption Index, it provides valuable contextual insight by highlighting untapped opportunities. A higher score signals greater labour market pressures - and thus greater potential benefits from timely adoption.
Skills-First Readiness and Adoption Index
The Skills-First Readiness and Adoption Index is a multi-dimensional index that captures employer practices, policy alignment, education and training systems, and individual experiences to offer an actionable picture of the degree of skills-first readiness and adoption across countries. It has been co-developed by the OECD Directorate for Employment, Labour and Social Affairs, in collaboration with the Centre for Skills-First Practices at the Singapore University of Social Sciences-Institute for Adult Learning (SUSS-IAL).
Talent Shortages
Labour market tightness
Number of job vacancies per unemployed worker
Employer-reported hiring difficulties
% of employers reporting difficulty filling jobs due to a lack of skilled talent
Lack of Workplace Diversity
Gender disparities in skills allocation across occupations
Mean percentage point difference between predicted and observed employment shares
Age concentration in occupations
Mean percentage point difference between predicted and observed employment shares
Worker Mobility Pressure
Prevalence of skills mismatch
% of workers reporting their skills to be either higher or lower than what is required by their job
Job dissatisfaction
% of workers who report being dissatisfied or extremely dissatisfied with their current work
Voluntary job exits due to skills mismatch
% of workers who left their last job because the job did not match their skills
Urgency for Reskilling and Upskilling
Anticipated core skills disruption
Average share of core skills required for workforce that employers expect to change by 2030
Frequency of learning new things at work
% of workers reporting their current job requires them to learn new things at least once a week
For a small subset of countries, data for some indicators are not available. Detailed information on the derivation of each indicator can be found in the Methodological Note. To request the full dataset, please contact the OECD team at ELSSkills1@oecd.org.
In collaboration with:
