Job Readiness in US – 39% are confident in their future competitiveness, 23 percent very confident FRB finds

The report presents findings from the September 2013 survey. The survey covered a range of topics—including household financial well-being, housing, credit availability, borrowing for education, savings, retirement, and medical expenses—meant to round out the understanding of how households are faring financially.

Overall, the survey found that many households were faring well, but that sizable fractions of the population were at the same time displaying signs of financial stress:

• Over 60 percent of respondents reported that their families are either “doing okay” or “living comfort- ably” financially; another one-fourth, however, said that they were “just getting by” financially and another 13 percent said they were struggling to do so

• The effects of the recession continued to be felt by many: 34 percent reported that they were some- what worse off or much worse off financially than they had been five years earlier, 34 percent reported that they were about the same, and 30 percent reported that they were somewhat or much better off

• 42 percent reported that they had delayed a major purchase or expense directly due to the recession, and 18 percent put off what they considered to be a major life decision as a result of the recession

• Just over half of respondents were putting some portion of their income away in savings, although about one-fifth were spending more than they earned

• 61 percent reported that they expected their income to stay the same in the next 12 months, while
21 percent expected it to increase and 16 percent expected it to decline

Retirement

Many households reported that they are not prepared for retirement. Almost half of respondents had not planned financially for retirement, with 24 percent saying they had given only a little thought to financial planning for their retirement and another 25 percent saying they had done no planning at all.

Job Readiness

The survey also asked respondents questions meant to gauge their perception of their own readiness for the current and future job market. In general, the results paint a picture of confidence about education and work experience. Respondents were asked, “Thinking about your current education and work experience, how confident are you that you have the skills necessary to get the kinds of jobs you want now?” Thirty-nine percent said they were somewhat confident, and 27 percent said they were very confident, that they have the skills and experience to compete in today’s job market (table 15). Only 18 percent said they were not confident.

When asked the same question, but this time thinking about the types of jobs respondents believed would be available 10 years down the road, confidence remained high. Thirty-nine percent said they were somewhat confident in their future competitiveness, and 23 percent said they were very confident. Again, about one-fifth (19 percent) said they were not confident.

When asked for all the reasons why they lacked confidence, needing additional education and needing additional job training were cited most frequently as the causes for concern, both for jobs now and for jobs in 10 years. For those concerned about current jobs, education was the most frequent response (49 percent), followed by job training (40 percent), while needing additional job training (48 percent) trumped needing further education (41 percent) as the most frequent cause of concern for jobs in 10 years. However, for both questions, skills being out of date, the rapidly changing job market, and a lack of availability of jobs they are qualified for were all cited as concerns by at least one-fifth of respon- dents who had expressed a lack of confidence.