Technological Change and Skill Gaps
Grant agreement no. 101132581 Deliverable: D4.10
This report studies whether updating vocational curricula reduces skill mismatch in Germany’s dual system. Linking the near-universe of training regulations to 2017–2025 job ads, it constructs an ESCO-based curriculum–job ad mismatch index and exploits curriculum revisions in a stacked difference-in-differences design. Curriculum updates reduce the share of demanded-but-not-supplied skills by about 4 percentage points. This effect is similar in occupations with high versus low technology exposure once controlling for the younger age and lower pre-update mismatch levels of high exposure occupations: Curricula which are more exposed to new technologies require more frequent updates to remain well-matched to demand relative to less exposed curricula. Combined with prior evidence that updates raise wages, the results highlight curriculum revision as a key education-policy lever for mitigating technologically induced skill obsolescence and improving match quality for vocationally trained workers.
SkiLMeeT Project