The Australian government recently revised its fee schedule for higher education in order to emphasise “job readiness”. Those who choose to study the humanities in Australia must fund their own education; in fields deemed to provide job training, the government has increased its tuition subsidy. In the UK, the Education Secretary, Gavin Williamson, echoed this principle in a recent speech on further education: “We must never forget that the purpose of education is to give people the skills they need to get a good and meaningful job.”
No one opposes offering widespread and high-quality vocational education to teach people how to provide essential services. The basic structure of the common good involves meeting human needs for water, sanitation, power, transport, health and access to the law. Such activities require training, and there is an obvious public interest in providing it. But reducing education to job training is not only a partial or limited view. It is sinister.
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