Evaluation Note / Yasemin Satır Çilingir & Murat Kenanoğlu

“Young men do not want to work in industry; rather they prefer to work in malls or restaurants.” Through various instances where we were forced to act as the ‘discharge station’ for company owners or managers from different sectors and cities, we concluded that these words are uttered in an ever-increasing manner in Turkey. This, therefore, begs the question; is there any truth to this claim? Today, we will discuss whether the claim holds true and related, why many firms in manufacturing experience difficulties in employing people, mainly the young while the recent youth unemployment rate (for ages 15-24) announced by TUIK is 19.8 percent.

Before starting the discussion about why millennials’ preferences are different, we should also note that employers in Turkey do not only complain about supply shortages in the industry but also about skills gap problems in the labor market. Therefore while trying to understand the reasons behind the aforementioned statement; an analysis is essential on the comparison of the requirements of industry jobs and the skills of the youth. Related, in the Manpower 2016-2017 Talent Shortage Survey employers from 43 different countries were surveyed with regards to the difficulty they face in filling job openings. Unsurprisingly, while the global average came out to as 40 percent, Turkey emerged as the 5^th country with the highest talent shortage with 66 percent, behind Hong Kong, Romania, Taiwan and Japan, respectively. Subsequently, aside from the millennials’ lack of desire to work in heavy industry, the labor force as a whole in Turkey fall short in attuning to the demand of the labor market. In turn, this shows the deficiencies in the design of educational programs, practical and vocational trainings that could adhere to the needs of the employers, therefore the market and eventually lead to a more qualified and educated labor force.

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