There is a clear link between skills, productivity and individual opportunity and yet employer investment in training continues to fall, now down 36% per employee since 2005.

This L&W briefing traces how employer investment in training has fallen and shows how skills spending tends to be skewed toward already highly skilled people and is often lighter touch than in other countries. The briefing looks at which sectors have seen the biggest falls, inequalities in access to training and where training may be short and risk having limited impact.

While the drivers of low employer investment in training are varied, incentives for firms to invest in training, particularly for lower skilled workers, are often insufficient. L&W argues that we must turn this around, with a number of approaches based on a clear business case and easy to access system, to get businesses investing in skills and improve economic growth.