Yes and no. For while those skills are undoubtedly necessary and needed, there are also somewhat more rudimentary improvements that could be made that could have an equally substantial impact. Indeed, economic modeling from Centre for Economic and Business Research argues that improving quite basic digital skills could not only help 1.7 million people find jobs each year but also add around £45.3 billion to the UK economy.
This is probably justified in and of itself, but the research also suggests that such upskilling would also bring many benefits to regions outside of places like London, which have traditionally hoovered up many of the benefits of the digital transformation of society. Indeed, the researchers believe that over 80% of the benefits would fall outside of the capital.
Perhaps the most important thing to note is that the digital skills the CEBR is talking about are not things like data science or cybersecurity. Instead, they break the skills down into three levels that cover what they refer to as “Essential Digital Skills (EDS)”. The three levels are foundational skills (being able to access the internet), EDS for life (being able to transact, purchase, and engage online), and EDS for work (being able to use basic business digital apps).