All this has an important bearing on the government’s ambition to secure strong and sustainable growth with rising living standards and equal opportunities for all. Technology and globalisation put a high premium on skills, which may not be well supplied by the education sector when change is rapid, but also on experience as a means of acquiring skills, disadvantaging youth. The global crisis has intensified the structural disadvantages of the young, as skills and experience are even more highly prized when macroeconomic conditions worsen. The education system must also do more to develop the human capital of low skilled youth, who are particularly vulnerable to shocks.