With the number of students significantly increasing, it is necessary to both hire more teachers and retain the current ones, a deficit of 80 000 teachers and pre-school teachers is expected by 2031 (Skolverket (National Agency for Education), 2017[ii7]). Compared to its peer countries, Sweden is placed below Germany (0.41), but above Austria and the Netherlands (0.18 and 0.01 respectively). Considering the division of the index by socio-economic profiles, Swedish principals working in the bottom quarter of schools report that the shortage of teaching staff to a greater extent hinders the schools' instruction capacity than the OECD average (0.76 compared to 0.15).