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KILM 9. Youth unemployment
Introduction
Youth unemployment is generally viewed as an important policy issue for many economies, regardless of their stage of development. For the purpose of this indicator, the term "youth" covers persons aged 15 to 24 years, and thus the term "adult" refers to those aged 25 and over. The indicator consists of four distinct measurements, each representing a different aspect of the youth unemployment problem. The four measurements are: (a) youth unemployment rate (youth unemployment as a percentage of the youth labour force); (b) ratio of the youth unemployment rate to the adult unemployment rate; (c) youth unemployment as a proportion of total unemployment; and (d) youth unemployment as a proportion of the youth population. Information on the third of these indices is available for 117 economies. For the other three, information is available, for at least one year, for 100 economies. In most cases, information is available separately for men and women.
Trends
Figure 9a. Youth and adult unemployment rates, 2001
Youth unemployment rates tend to exceed adult unemployment rates. In the majority of economies, youth unemployment rates are at least double those of adults. Germany is the only economy shown where the ratio remains around 1, possibly indicating the success of the German apprenticeship system in facilitating the transition from school to work.
Figure 9b. Unemployment and illiteracy rates of young persons aged 15 to 24 years, 2000
It is not easy to establish empirically a connection between the accessibility of jobs for young people and their corresponding level of educational attainment. It might be expected that it is the less-educated young people who suffer most in terms of attaining jobs; however, without direct information on the education level of each young jobseeker the connection can never be clear. The illiteracy rate of young people (aged 15 to 24 years) is used here as a proxy for the educational access of youth in the country. Oddly enough, the results show very little correlation between the illiteracy and unemployment rates and the negative relationship is not supported. Economies may have a fairly high youth illiteracy rate - between 3 and 4 per cent - while the youth unemployment rate can be anything from 4.4 per cent (Mexico) to 36.3 per cent (Colombia).
Figure 9c. Youth unemployment rate, informal economy employment and the ratio of youth-to-adult unemployment rates, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica and Paraguay, 1990 and 1996
Several economies in Central and Latin America have both a high youth unemployment rate and a large informal economy, which suggests that stagnation of job creation in the formal sector has intensified the unemployment problem of youth. Still, for three of the four economies shown, unemployment increased between 1990 and 1996 for both young people and adults, so that the ratio of youth and adult employment rates actually fell slightly. It is thus difficult to claim that a weak formal economy affects youth disproportionately to adults.
