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Work, education and prosperity

Dr Bob Birrell is the director of the Centre for Population and Urban Research at Monash University and author with Virginia Rapson of Clearing the Myths Away: Higher Education's Place in Meeting Workforce Demands. He writes in The Age today:

"Is Australia's prosperity delivering dividends in the education and training that the country needs?

Clearly not. Popular myths about education and training seem to have hijacked public debates.

As a result, recent Federal Government policy on higher education and training has been misguided.

The three principal myths are:

1. There has been too much emphasis on university education.

2. There is inherent conflict between expanding trade training and maintaining or increasing university education.

3. The number of young people entering the workforce will fall".

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