The middle-aged workers too qualified for their jobs

ALMOST a fifth of middle- aged professionals are ‘over- qualified’ for their job amid an increase in career swaps later in life.

Those in their 30s and 40s are most likely to be ‘over-educated’, according to a report from the Office for National Statistics.

Among those aged 35 to 49, 18.4 per cent had more education than required to do their job in 2016, the highest percentage since records began in 2006.

Only 10.9 per cent of those classed as Generation Z – aged 16 to 24 – were considered over-educated. As more people go to university, the ONS said that overall 31 per cent of graduates were doing a job which was below their skill level.

Christopher Snowdon, of the Institute of Economic Affairs, told the Daily Telegraph that changing career in midlife ‘no doubt plays a part’ in the record figures, but said that it was unclear from the data.

He added: ‘Nearly two decades after Tony Blair decided that 50 per cent of young people should go to university, we find large numbers of graduates in nongraduate work.

‘There was never any reason to think that the British economy required half the population to have degrees. The result is that we have a large and growing number of people who find themselves in jobs they could have got without racking up student debt.’