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Over 70 million young people are unemployed throughout the world according to ILO estimates. In countries as diverse as Colombia, Egypt, Italy and Jamaica, more than one in three young persons are classified as "unemployed" - declaring themselves to be without work, to be searching for work and/or to be available for work. The most seriously affected regions are Southern Europe (Greece, Italy and Spain), Eastern Europe (particularly Bulgaria, Latvia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Poland) and the Caribbean (including Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago). However, youth unemployment is not high in all countries. In Austria, Japan, Mexico, Singapore, South Korea and the United Republic of Tanzania, less than one in 12 young workers is unemployed and the difference between youth and adult rates is relatively low. (Country data relate to 1997 or earlier.)
Greater burden on teenagers
In most countries, teenagers experience higher unemployment rates than do those in their early twenties. However, the difference is small in such countries as India and Indonesia and only moderate in most developed countries. In France and Germany, where the unemployment rate for teenagers is less than for young adults, mass labour market programmes and apprenticeships that target teenagers have reduced their rate of unemployment.
Greater burden on young women
In many developing countries, as well as in some developed ones, such as France, more young women are unemployed than young men, but in other countries, such as Hungary, India, Indonesia, some Latin American countries and the majority of developed countries, the gender difference is small or negligible. However, discrimination in access to education and job opportunities is more widely evident. Young women typically face higher unemployment rates than young men or have lower participation rates, although the situation varies considerably between countries. In many countries, girls are outperforming boys at school, but this does not necessarily translate into greater labour market success. This is so, in part, because many girls remain concentrated in traditional fields of study, often not related to rapidly evolving labour market needs. In some countries - France, Jamaica and Japan, for example - where girls have equal access to education, some may still be the intended or unintended targets of gender discrimination. In other countries, such as Ghana, India and Kenya, girls' access to education and training is limited, forcing young women disproportionately into the informal sector and subsistence-oriented activities. Yet in others, economic inactivity is imposed on young women.
Underemployment: a growing problem
Unemployment is but one dimension of the employment problem faced by young people. A disproportionately large number of the young in many countries are underemployed, some working fewer hours than they would like to and others working very long hours with little gain. Some young people may be able to obtain only part-time work, for example, in France (particularly young women) and Indonesia; or seasonal work as happens in the agriculturally based economies of south Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. Underemployment is also high among many young people who work in household production units in the rural and urban informal sectors. In poorer countries, where public or family sources provide little income support, jobless young people are often denied the "luxury" of remaining unemployed. They eke out a living by means of low productivity work in the lower, subsistence-oriented, reaches of the informal sector or in such low yield activities as odd jobs, hawking and car washing. Here the problem may not be short hours but excessively long hours with little reward. The widespread stagnation and decline of employment opportunities in the formal sectors of most developing countries has intensified the problem in recent years, with young women bearing a disproportionate burden.
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