Forecasting Blockchain Skills Demand and Supply.

Popularity of blockchain technology has increased over the last decade. This is due to growing interest in faster, more transparent, and decentralised transfer of information. Although organisations from a wide range of industries and different areas of operations are using blockchain technology it requires a unique set of skills to implement such technology in any institutional setting. The key objective of this study is the development of a forecasting model for the supply and demand of blockchain skills in order to examine the impact of this emerging technology on the labour force across Europe over the next five years. We have collected a sufficient volume of blockchain labour market data to perform the time series analysis and forecast the evolution of blockchain skill demand and supply. In order to forecast blockchain skills demand, we map over 6,500 blockchain related job adverts in 2021 to ISCO categories that are most likely to contain blockchain employment. We build on CEDEFOP's employment and occupational forecasts across Europe and incorporate EU-LFS occupational data to estimate changes in blockchain related occupations from 2021 to 2026. In order to forecast blockchain skills supply, we utilise information on the number of graduates from blockchain related and blockchain specific courses across Europe. The data for skills supply comes from national educational authorities and Eurostat. We apply linear trends to graduate data from 2015 to 2019 to forecast blockchain skills supply from 2020 to 2026. We find that on average approximately 85% of blockchain related jobs in Europe are represented by the following five ISCO categories: software developers, database and network professionals, ICT Service managers, business services administration managers, and legal professionals. The remaining 15% of blockchain related are in 'Other' ISCO categories. Our forecasting results indicate that approximately 25,000 new blockchain jobs in Europe will be created from 2021 to 2026 of which 12,000 are estimated to be entry level or graduate jobs. We also find that approximately 14,000 new blockchain graduates in Europe will be available from 2020 to 2026. The results suggest that the number of blockchain graduates when compared to the demand for blockchain work at the graduate level in total across Europe are roughly in line. However, the findings vary distinctively at a country level, and it is likely that more specific training courses, focusing on key skill development areas that are relevant for blockchain labour demand are still required over the coming years. This paper is the first to map blockchain related jobs to occupational categories in Europe, providing evidence on the occupations that blockchain workers are most likely to be employed in. Our findings from the blockchain skills forecasts also estimate the supply of blockchain workers over time to satisfy the demands by the sector. This paper provides detailed information, at a country level for Europe, to assist in the anticipation of future blockchain skill demand and supply, in order to act as an early warning information mechanism to mitigate possible labour market imbalances, and support education, training and labour market actors in making evidence-based decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]