Cgia: One in four employees is over-educated, which causes demotivation and low productivity

• Cgia alarm.

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• Cgia: occasional work in decline, 592,000 employed with less than 10 hours a week

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05 September 2020 There are over 5,800,000 over-educated employees in Italy. This is said by the CGIA Research Office. We refer to graduates and graduates who carry out a profession for which the most requested qualification is lower than that possessed. In 2019 they were just under 25 per cent of the total number of employees and their incidence is constantly increasing: in the last 10 years, in fact, the absolute data of over-educated in Italy have grown by almost 30 per cent. Furthermore, if we calculate the percentage only of those employed who have a high school diploma or a degree, last year the incidence of over-educated persons rose to 40 percent.

The coordinator of the Studies Office Paolo Zabeo states: "The increase in over-educated people is largely due to the mismatch between the specialized skills required by companies and those possessed by candidates. It should not be forgotten - he continues - that thanks to the generational turnover in recent years many over 60s with low levels of education have left the labor market and have been replaced by young graduates or graduates with no professional experience behind them. 

However, over-education should not be underestimated, because it very often activates demotivation and discouragement that negatively affect the level of productivity of the worker concerned and consequently of the company in which he is employed. The climate of discouragement that is created can trigger situations of malaise that spreading among colleagues can even affect entire sectors or production departments, with very negative effects

for the life of the company ".

To combat over-education, the CGIA informs, it is absolutely necessary to reduce the gap between supply and demand of work, trying to make business needs more and more coincide with the specificities and autonomy of the school world. 

Although in our country the problem of over-education is constantly increasing, paradoxically we continue to be among the least educated in Europe.

Secretary Renato Mason denounces: "Last year the share of the Italian population between 25 and 64 years with at least an upper secondary qualification was 62.2 percent, a figure much lower than the average for the Union 28, equal to 78.8 per cent and that of some of our main competitors. In fact, I would point out that France recorded 80.4, the United Kingdom 81.1 and Germany 86.6 per cent.

No less wide is the gap in the percentage of those who have obtained a tertiary qualification, always in the age group between 25 and 64 years. If in 2019 in Italy the threshold was 19.6 per cent , the European average was 33.2. It should be noted that the share of Italian graduates between 25-34 year-olds in Stem 1 disciplines is similar to the average of the 22 countries of the European Union that are members of the OECD. strong gender gap If for the male component the difference is 6 points with the EU average, the incidence d

elle Italian graduates in technical disciplines is instead higher than the European average ".

According to the CGIA, the role of SMEs would allow to stem the spread of the phenomenon.

Although there is no data that allows us to accurately measure the level of over-education by company size, daily experience teaches us that the role of the workers in small businesses is central to those who work in larger companies.

In fact, in SMEs, in addition to having the formal knowledge learned during the school experience, mainly of a technical / professional nature, the employees, thanks to the "extended" tasks they practice in these small production companies, have more extensive operational and experiential knowledge and complex of those who, on the other hand, carry out their work in a defined manner and in very limited areas.

As often happens for those employed in a large company. 

At a territorial level, the region most "affected" by the phenomenon is Umbria, which last year recorded 33 per cent of over-educated people out of the total employed.

Followed by Abruzzo (30.3 percent), Basilicata (29.4 percent), Molise (27.8 percent) and Lazio (27.2 percent).

At the bottom of the ranking we see Piedmont (22.2 per cent), Lombardy (21.7 per cent) and Trentino Alto Adige (19.3 per cent).

In the last 10 years, the most sustained growth in the number of over-educated employees has been in Trentino Alto Adige (+57 percent), followed by Sardinia (+46 percent), and Puglia (+45 percent).

Among graduates who carry out a job for which the most requested qualification is lower than that possessed, the most common professions are those of computer technician, accountant, secretarial staff, administrative employee.

Among the graduates, on the other hand, the jobs of bartender, waiter, bricklayer and truck driver prevail.

Although in recent years there has been a contraction of the phenomenon, a high number of young people continue to leave school prematurely, including compulsory schooling, contributing to increasing youth unemployment, the risk of poverty and social exclusion.

In 2019, school dropout was 13.5 percent (for a total of 561,000 young people).

A person who does not have a minimum level of education, in fact, is generally destined for a lifelong unskilled job, often precarious and with a very low salary level, compared to what he could aspire to, at least potentially, if he possessed a title of medium-high study.

The causes that determine school dropout are mainly cultural, social and economic: children who come from socially disadvantaged backgrounds and from families with a low level of education are more likely to drop out of school before completing their studies.

There is also a gender factor: more boys than girls drop out of school early.

Despite youth unemployment is high, the level of education is still well below European standards and early school leaving remains strong, even in the midst of the Covid phase, companies have struggled to find personal.

Although it is a very special month, according to the periodic survey conducted on a significant sample of companies by Unioncamere and Anpal, around 30 percent of the 200,000 hires expected in August were difficult to find, with peaks of 39.6 percent in Friuli Venezia Giulia, 38.1 percent in Umbria, 37.6 percent in Veneto and 37.5 percent in Trentino Alto Adige.

Among the professions that are not easy to cover, we point out the mechanical craftsmen, fitters, repairers and maintenance workers of fixed and mobile machines (53.5 percent), craftsmen and workers specialized in construction finishing (43.1 percent) and bus drivers and heavy vehicles (42.5 per cent).