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There has been a dramatic shift of employment in three major economic sectors-agriculture, manufacture and services during the last three quarters of the twentieth century. Employment in agriculture used to be dominant for a long time even in the developed countries, accounting for a large proportion of labour force. Take United States as an example, particularly during colonial times, over ninety per cent of all workers made their living in farming. It was not surpassed by employment in manufacturing sector until 1925 on account of rapid manufacturing development under Fordism. (Dufrene and Altmann, 2007). Manufacturing accounts for a large share of jobs in the different industries, such as heavy industry (industrial machinery, mining) and light industry (textiles, furniture). In 1955, for instance, manufacturing employment in the UK had reached a peak level when the sector experienced the highest percentage of GDP (George, Joll and Lynk, 1992). However, after that, such complexion had been gradually replaced by employment services. It is partly because of strong growth in productivity by means of computer technology instead of much labour involvement, and company restructuring, such as downsizing and redundancy due to global competition, making it possible for more and more people to engage in a service industry. In the meanwhile, service work offers more positions and opportunitites for workers with differents skills and capabilities. Take America as an example, nearly 95 per cent of the 25 million net new jobs have been provided by services since 1969 (Richard and Kirkland, 1985). Nowadays, employment in agriculture and manufacturing seems to be fading away. Farmers ‘account for no more than 3 per cent in any developed country’ (Drucker, 2001) and in America, ‘a little more than one-tenth of the nation’s are employed by manufacturing firms’ (Hagenbaugh, 2002). To be contrasted, employment in service industries has been on the rise. For instance, between 1974 and 1994 service sector employment rose by 9 per cent to 73 per cent in the USA, by 13 per cent to 71 per cent in Australia (OECD, 1996). Moreover, the contribution of service industries to the nation’s economy seems to be more remarkable, such as UK, the services sector represents approximately 74 per cent of its economy (Evans, 2006). However, there seems to be a problem that such booming service economy does not necessary mean rich and wealthy. Different jobs in service work involve different skills. Compared with other occupations, like doctor or lawyer, call center workers have little wages and status. However, does it really mean that those people have low-level skills? Since the term ‘skill’ is closely related to human life, it is important to clarify it and look to any changes in skills with the shift to services. Emphasis in this article will be placed on this issue and discussed further.

This essay attempts to give an overview of the Skills Change. It will first give a general interpretation of ‘skill’ and its new meaning. It will then demonstrate the skills of change in service work in terms of tangible and in本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。