Mid-term Employment Forecast for Austria and its Länder. Occupational and Sectoral Changes in 2006–2012

WIFO regularly develops projections of employment trends broken down by occupational groups, sectors and gender, with a view to obtaining a mid-term estimate of the skills requirements. To achieve this, a model-supported forecast infrastructure has been developed. The latest effort covers the period of 2006–2012, for the first time offering detailed forecasts (23 sectoral groups and 27 occupational groups) also at the level of the nine Länder. At a growth of overall employment of about 1 percent per year, it found a distinct trend towards higher skills requirements and more service- and customer-focused jobs. While low-skilled work in manufacturing loses its importance, the demand for such workers in the services sector is growing.