Flexible careers? New skills acquisitions over the life course

在整个生命过程中，有强大的政策驱动因素支撑着再技能和再培训。对技能水平和短缺对英国国际经济竞争力、生产力和社会流动性的影响的长期担忧，导致历届政府取消了年龄限制，并增加了支持学徒制等培训计划的资金（DfES 2003; Fuller et al 2015）。与此同时，在英国等新自由主义经济体中，由于劳动力的萎缩和“全球老龄化”导致的福利压力的增加，“生产性老龄化”话语的升级（Moulaert and Biggs 2012）。这些都支持了这样一种观点，即在一生中持续工作到晚年，对经济、健康和福祉都有重大好处。然而，矛盾的是，越来越多的证据表明，“不合时宜”的再培训存在强大的经济、文化和社会障碍（Leonard et al, 2017）。由于数字技术和文化创意产业的特殊技能短缺，该项目将直接与企业合作，采取比较案例研究的方法，探讨在这些行业进行再培训和开始新职业的挑战。

There are strong policy drivers underpinning reskilling and retraining over the lifecourse. Perennial concerns about the impact of skill levels and shortages on the United Kingdom's (UK) international economic competitiveness, productivity and social mobility have led successive governments to lift age limits and increase funding to support training schemes such as apprenticeships (DfES 2003; Fuller et al 2015). At the same time, there has been an escalation of 'productive ageing' discourses in neoliberal economies such as the UK due to the contraction of labour forces and heightened pressures on welfare benefits due to 'global greying' (Moulaert and Biggs 2012). These support the view that there are significant financial, health and well-being benefits to sustained working over the life course and into later life. However, contradictorily, evidence is emerging to suggest that there are powerful financial, cultural and social barriers to retraining 'out of time' (Leonard et al 2017). With particular skills shortages in digital technology and the cultural and creative industries, this project will engage directly with businesses to take a comparative case study approach to explore the challenges to retraining and starting new careers within these sectors.