Sunday Posts

Whether we call it the 'Second' Machine Age or the 'Fourth' Industrial Revolution, the idea that we are at some kind of technological tipping point - that moment in history where society would change - seem to have consensus. Such change, going by historical experience, means different things, doing new things and not doing old things as well as finding new ways of doing old things. This transformation, all these new ways, is a function of education. There are winners and losers of the transformation so far. All economic evidence points to a massive loss of privilege for the middle classes, though the feel-good factor of house prices somewhat soothed the effect. In fact, the stagnation of middle class life, despite all the excitements of Uber-hailing cabs, is present and clear, making the economists question whether the Information Technology revolution has had much beneficial impact on living standards, particularly in comparison with earlier episodes of industri...

Apprenticeships are all the rage, and rightfully so: There is possibly no better way to learn some of the trades without actually doing it alongside a skilled master. While this is universally understood and accepted, what's not so clear is that government funding this and colleges and training companies running it really works. Despite the talk around apprenticeships, many really end up with dead-end positions, with little prospect or pay, loads of work and little learning. The training often tends to be motivational fluff, just the kind one hoped to escape when choosing to go down the apprentice route, and instead of the 'master', one usually gets a failed practitioner as the Guru. Call it modern apprenticeships, this has to nothing to do with what it was in its traditional form. The communities are all gone: They have been stripped away by our organized dislike of unionized labour. The pride of work has also been taken away: It is about the money one earns and often...