ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at continuing education from the perspective of an individual's career, as well as in terms of employment opportunities as years pass by and the individual ages. The British Luddites' action disregarded the fact that, overall, many workers found employment in industries created by what was then new technologies, such as textile manufacturing and, later, steel, automobiles and aircraft production. In macroeconomics, unemployment is a lagging indicator of economic health. Despite various summits', the European Union (EU) still lacks a worked-out idea of how governments should coordinate their employment and labour market policies. Economists list many issues that distort labour markets. A fruitful way of thinking about the issue, even if it is insufficient to settle it, is to ask to what degree any particular measure of harmonization in employment policies and labour laws promotes or retards competition in the EU, both: among companies and governments.
