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Timmy elsewhere

At the ASI.

Phone call for Polly T. Precisely because it is expensive to train the untrained therefore we don’t want a minimum wage.

3 thoughts on “Timmy elsewhere”

  1. I’m not going to defend the minimum wage, and this depends a bit on what sort of jobs we’re talking about here, but even if you remove that, there’s still a “tragedy of the commons” problem with training of programmers. It costs a lot of money to train someone, both in terms of training courses and being trained by senior staff.

    Old apprenticeships got around this by guilds and indentured service – you learnt a trade, but you had to work for someone for a few years afterwards. Companies have tried having contracts where employees pay back training costs if they leave within a few years and those got thrown out in the courts.

    We might think that teaching kids programming in schools is a good idea, and I’ve nothing against it, but it’s a basic level of understanding of the whole job. The two main routes into programming are either getting a degree or someone who is working somewhere who has a problem and teaches themselves programming to solve it, leading to a sideways move into the IT department.

    It’s also worth pointing out that this isn’t just happening in Wales. I know someone who is looking at taking on an apprentice as a programmer and I think it may be under a scheme started under this government.

  2. The great tragedy of the drive to get more people into university education has been the destruction of the technical colleges. 3 years at a university is a poor way to train for technological skills, modular and part time education while working is much more effective IMO.

  3. David, may depend on the course.
    A number of universities have set up courses in collaboration with employers or trade groups specifically to cover what is required.

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