Monday, October 30, 2006
[IWS] ILO: GLOBAL EMPLOYMENT TRENDS FOR YOUTH [27 October 2006]
IWS Documented News Service
_______________________________
Institute for Workplace Studies----------------- Professor Samuel B. Bacharach
School of Industrial & Labor Relations-------- Director, Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell University
16 East 34th Street, 4th floor---------------------- Stuart Basefsky
New York, NY 10016 -------------------------------Director, IWS News Bureau
________________________________________________________________________
International Labour Organization (ILO)
GLOBAL EMPLOYMENT TRENDS FOR YOUTH [27 October 2006]
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/employment/strat/download/gety06en.pdf
[full-text, 58 pages]
[excerpt]
This report adds to growing evidence of a global situation in which young people face
increasing difficulties when entering the labour force. One of the principal findings is that a global
deficit of decent work opportunities has resulted in a situation in which one out of every three youth in
the world is either seeking but unable to find work, has given up the job search entirely or is working
but still living below the US$2 a day poverty line. Without the right foothold from which to start out
right in the labour market, young people are less able to make choices that will improve their own job
prospects and those of their future dependents. This, in turn, perpetuates the cycle of insufficient
education, low-productivity employment and working poverty from one generation to the next. The
report, therefore, adds urgency to the UN call for development of strategies aimed to give young
people a chance to make the most of their productive potential through decent employment.
This report provides empirical research as well as quantitative assessments of the realities of
youth labour markets to build an analytical starting block from which countries can identify the main
challenges facing youth for the process of designing the policies most suited to their particular
situations. At the same time, the data and analyses in the Global Employment Trends for Youth will
strengthen the capacity of the ILOs programme on youth employment to provide assistance to
countries in developing coherent and coordinated interventions on youth employment that are based
on analytical reviews of labour market information.
For further expansion of the youth employment knowledge base, the need is not one of
developing new indicators, but rather finding a way to make use of the indicators that already exist
(labour force participation rates, employment ratios, unemployment rates, employment by status and
by sector, long-term unemployment, underemployment, hours of work and poverty). The challenge,
however, is that, as of now, many of the labour market indicators listed here cannot be applied to
youth because most countries do not provide the data disaggregated by age. The ILO is intensifying its
efforts to gather the data by age groups. This will help to improve the accuracy and reliability of
labour market analyses within a life-cycle perspective.
Contents
1. Overview ..................................................................................................................................... 1
Why focus on youth? ..............................................................................................................1
How are young people faring in the labour market?................................................................2
Misconceptions concerning youth and youth labour markets..................................................6
Summary and outlook ..............................................................................................................9
2. Labour market trends for youth ..............................................................................................11
2.1 Demographic trends and developments in youth labour force participation..................11
2.2 Trends in youth employment..........................................................................................15
2.3 Trends in youth unemployment ......................................................................................16
2.4 Other labour market indicators for youth .......................................................................20
2.5 Summary........................................................................................................................21
3. Trends in youth poverty and working poverty ........................................................................22
3.1 Measuring youth poverty................................................................................................22
3.2 Going beyond youth poverty to youth working poverty ................................................23
3.3. The need to know more about poverty ...........................................................................26
4. Explaining youth inactivity and labour market vulnerability................................................28
4.1 Explaining youth inactivity ............................................................................................28
4.2 Explaining labour market vulnerability among youth....................................................33
5. The school-to-work transition ..................................................................................................36
5.2 The ILO concept of the school-to-work transition: measuring the transition to decent work...........36
5.3 Some preliminary results ...............................................................................................37
5.4 Summary........................................................................................................................43
Annexes
1 Key regional labour market indicators for youth and issues for consideration ............................44
2 Global employment trends regional groupings..........................................................................48
3 Glossary of labour market terms...................................................................................................49
References ............................................................................................................................................51
Tables
Table 2.1: Youth share in total working-age population, 1995 and 2005 ..........................................13
Table 2.2: Development of the youth labour force and youth population between 1995 and 2005 and expected net growth of the youth labour force between 2005 and 2015.................... 13
Table 2.3: Youth labour force participation rates, by sex, 1995 and 2005 .........................................15
Table 2.4: Youth employment and youth employment-to-population ratios ......................................16
Table 2.5: Total youth unemployment, 1995, 2004 and 2005 ...........................................................16
Table 2.6: Ratio of youth-to-adult unemployment rates, 1995 and 2005 ...........................................18
Table 2.7: Youth share in total unemployed and youth share in total working-age population, 1995 and 2005.... 20
Table 3.1: Poverty estimates of undernourished young people (1999-2001) and young people
living on less than US$1 a day and US$2 a day, by region, 2002 .....................................22
Table 3.2: US$1 and US$2 a day working poverty among youth, total numbers and youth working poverty rates ........................26
Table 4.1: Youth inactivity and inactivity rates (1995 and 2005) and female share of total inactive youth (2005) ................28
Table 5.1: Sampling size, reference period and survey coverage .......................................................37
Table 5.2: Distribution of employed youth by type of employment contract .....................................38
Table 5.3: Distribution of youth in transition, by current activity status ............................................39
Table 5.4: Distribution of youth outside of the labour force by reason for inactivity, by sex ............40
Table 5.5: Main obstacles to finding decent work identified by in-transit youth ...............................40
Table 5.6: Transited youth by education level ....................................................................................41
Table 5.7: Most important factors influencing employers decisions when hiring young men and women, by type of post (professional/administrative or manual/production) ...................42
Table 5.8: Employers preferences of education level when hiring young men and women, by type of post (professional/administrative or manual/production) .................................42
Table 5.10: Employers general skills assessment of young job applicants and young workers, by type of skill and overall general preparedness ..............................................................42
Table 5.11: Sampling size, reference period and survey coverage .......................................................43
Figures
Figure 1: What we do and do not know about the global youth labour market ..................................5
Figure 2.1: Regional distribution of the youth population, 2005 and 2015..........................................11
Figure 2.2: Population distribution by child, youth and adult age cohorts, by region, 1995, 2005
and 2015............................................................................................................................12
Figure 2.3: Global youth unemployment and youth unemployment rates, 1995-2005........................17
Figure 2.4: Youth unemployment rates, by region, 1995 and 2005 .....................................................17
Figure 2.5: Distribution of the youth and adult populations by activity status, 2005...........................21
Figure 4.1: Youth inactivity rates and GDP per capita (at PPP), 2005 ................................................29
Figure 4.2: Percentage change in gross enrolment ratios at the tertiary level and the percentage
change in youth inactivity rates, by region, 1990-2002.....................................................30
Figure 4.3: Share of youth neither in employment nor education (NEET) in total youth population,
regional averages ...............................................................................................................33
Figure 4.4: Determining vulnerability among young people ...............................................................35
Figure 5.1: Distribution of youth by current activity status, by sex .....................................................38
Figure 5.2: Distribution of youth by stage of transition .......................................................................39
Figure 5.3: Distribution of educational level of respondents by stage of transition, Egypt
and Nepal ...........................................................................................................................41
Figure 5.4: Employers general skills assessment of young job applicants and young workers, by type of skill and overall general preparedness ..............................................................42
Boxes
Box 1: What is youth? .....................................................................................................................2
Box 2: ILO methodology for producing world and regional estimates of labour market indicators.......................6
Box 2.1: Why are youth unemployment rates higher than adult unemployment rates?...................19
Box 2.2: Inequalities in youth labour markets..................................................................................20
Box 3.1: What is poverty? ................................................................................................................23
Box 3.2: What is working poverty?..................................................................................................24
Box 3.3: Young girls and young refugees have the lowest chances to escape poverty....................27
See Press Release
New ILO study says youth unemployment rising, with hundreds of millions more working but living in poverty
Friday 27 October 2006 (ILO/06/48)
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/bureau/inf/pr/2006/48.htm
GENEVA (ILO News) - The number of unemployed youth aged 15 to 24 rose over the past decade, while hundreds of millions more are working but living in poverty, according to a new report by the International Labour Office (ILO)
AND MORE.....
______________________________
This information is provided to subscribers, friends, faculty, students and alumni of the School of Industrial & Labor Relations (ILR). It is a service of the Institute for Workplace Studies (IWS) in New York City. Stuart Basefsky is responsible for the selection of the contents which is intended to keep researchers, companies, workers, and governments aware of the latest information related to ILR disciplines as it becomes available for the purposes of research, understanding and debate. The content does not reflect the opinions or positions of Cornell University, the School of Industrial & Labor Relations, or that of Mr. Basefsky and should not be construed as such. The service is unique in that it provides the original source documentation, via links, behind the news and research of the day. Use of the information provided is unrestricted. However, it is requested that users acknowledge that the information was found via the IWS Documented News Service.
Stuart Basefsky
Director, IWS News Bureau
Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell/ILR School
16 E. 34th Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY 10016
Telephone: (607) 255-2703
Fax: (607) 255-9641
E-mail: smb6@cornell.edu
****************************************
_______________________________
Institute for Workplace Studies----------------- Professor Samuel B. Bacharach
School of Industrial & Labor Relations-------- Director, Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell University
16 East 34th Street, 4th floor---------------------- Stuart Basefsky
New York, NY 10016 -------------------------------Director, IWS News Bureau
________________________________________________________________________
International Labour Organization (ILO)
GLOBAL EMPLOYMENT TRENDS FOR YOUTH [27 October 2006]
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/employment/strat/download/gety06en.pdf
[full-text, 58 pages]
[excerpt]
This report adds to growing evidence of a global situation in which young people face
increasing difficulties when entering the labour force. One of the principal findings is that a global
deficit of decent work opportunities has resulted in a situation in which one out of every three youth in
the world is either seeking but unable to find work, has given up the job search entirely or is working
but still living below the US$2 a day poverty line. Without the right foothold from which to start out
right in the labour market, young people are less able to make choices that will improve their own job
prospects and those of their future dependents. This, in turn, perpetuates the cycle of insufficient
education, low-productivity employment and working poverty from one generation to the next. The
report, therefore, adds urgency to the UN call for development of strategies aimed to give young
people a chance to make the most of their productive potential through decent employment.
This report provides empirical research as well as quantitative assessments of the realities of
youth labour markets to build an analytical starting block from which countries can identify the main
challenges facing youth for the process of designing the policies most suited to their particular
situations. At the same time, the data and analyses in the Global Employment Trends for Youth will
strengthen the capacity of the ILOs programme on youth employment to provide assistance to
countries in developing coherent and coordinated interventions on youth employment that are based
on analytical reviews of labour market information.
For further expansion of the youth employment knowledge base, the need is not one of
developing new indicators, but rather finding a way to make use of the indicators that already exist
(labour force participation rates, employment ratios, unemployment rates, employment by status and
by sector, long-term unemployment, underemployment, hours of work and poverty). The challenge,
however, is that, as of now, many of the labour market indicators listed here cannot be applied to
youth because most countries do not provide the data disaggregated by age. The ILO is intensifying its
efforts to gather the data by age groups. This will help to improve the accuracy and reliability of
labour market analyses within a life-cycle perspective.
Contents
1. Overview ..................................................................................................................................... 1
Why focus on youth? ..............................................................................................................1
How are young people faring in the labour market?................................................................2
Misconceptions concerning youth and youth labour markets..................................................6
Summary and outlook ..............................................................................................................9
2. Labour market trends for youth ..............................................................................................11
2.1 Demographic trends and developments in youth labour force participation..................11
2.2 Trends in youth employment..........................................................................................15
2.3 Trends in youth unemployment ......................................................................................16
2.4 Other labour market indicators for youth .......................................................................20
2.5 Summary........................................................................................................................21
3. Trends in youth poverty and working poverty ........................................................................22
3.1 Measuring youth poverty................................................................................................22
3.2 Going beyond youth poverty to youth working poverty ................................................23
3.3. The need to know more about poverty ...........................................................................26
4. Explaining youth inactivity and labour market vulnerability................................................28
4.1 Explaining youth inactivity ............................................................................................28
4.2 Explaining labour market vulnerability among youth....................................................33
5. The school-to-work transition ..................................................................................................36
5.2 The ILO concept of the school-to-work transition: measuring the transition to decent work...........36
5.3 Some preliminary results ...............................................................................................37
5.4 Summary........................................................................................................................43
Annexes
1 Key regional labour market indicators for youth and issues for consideration ............................44
2 Global employment trends regional groupings..........................................................................48
3 Glossary of labour market terms...................................................................................................49
References ............................................................................................................................................51
Tables
Table 2.1: Youth share in total working-age population, 1995 and 2005 ..........................................13
Table 2.2: Development of the youth labour force and youth population between 1995 and 2005 and expected net growth of the youth labour force between 2005 and 2015.................... 13
Table 2.3: Youth labour force participation rates, by sex, 1995 and 2005 .........................................15
Table 2.4: Youth employment and youth employment-to-population ratios ......................................16
Table 2.5: Total youth unemployment, 1995, 2004 and 2005 ...........................................................16
Table 2.6: Ratio of youth-to-adult unemployment rates, 1995 and 2005 ...........................................18
Table 2.7: Youth share in total unemployed and youth share in total working-age population, 1995 and 2005.... 20
Table 3.1: Poverty estimates of undernourished young people (1999-2001) and young people
living on less than US$1 a day and US$2 a day, by region, 2002 .....................................22
Table 3.2: US$1 and US$2 a day working poverty among youth, total numbers and youth working poverty rates ........................26
Table 4.1: Youth inactivity and inactivity rates (1995 and 2005) and female share of total inactive youth (2005) ................28
Table 5.1: Sampling size, reference period and survey coverage .......................................................37
Table 5.2: Distribution of employed youth by type of employment contract .....................................38
Table 5.3: Distribution of youth in transition, by current activity status ............................................39
Table 5.4: Distribution of youth outside of the labour force by reason for inactivity, by sex ............40
Table 5.5: Main obstacles to finding decent work identified by in-transit youth ...............................40
Table 5.6: Transited youth by education level ....................................................................................41
Table 5.7: Most important factors influencing employers decisions when hiring young men and women, by type of post (professional/administrative or manual/production) ...................42
Table 5.8: Employers preferences of education level when hiring young men and women, by type of post (professional/administrative or manual/production) .................................42
Table 5.10: Employers general skills assessment of young job applicants and young workers, by type of skill and overall general preparedness ..............................................................42
Table 5.11: Sampling size, reference period and survey coverage .......................................................43
Figures
Figure 1: What we do and do not know about the global youth labour market ..................................5
Figure 2.1: Regional distribution of the youth population, 2005 and 2015..........................................11
Figure 2.2: Population distribution by child, youth and adult age cohorts, by region, 1995, 2005
and 2015............................................................................................................................12
Figure 2.3: Global youth unemployment and youth unemployment rates, 1995-2005........................17
Figure 2.4: Youth unemployment rates, by region, 1995 and 2005 .....................................................17
Figure 2.5: Distribution of the youth and adult populations by activity status, 2005...........................21
Figure 4.1: Youth inactivity rates and GDP per capita (at PPP), 2005 ................................................29
Figure 4.2: Percentage change in gross enrolment ratios at the tertiary level and the percentage
change in youth inactivity rates, by region, 1990-2002.....................................................30
Figure 4.3: Share of youth neither in employment nor education (NEET) in total youth population,
regional averages ...............................................................................................................33
Figure 4.4: Determining vulnerability among young people ...............................................................35
Figure 5.1: Distribution of youth by current activity status, by sex .....................................................38
Figure 5.2: Distribution of youth by stage of transition .......................................................................39
Figure 5.3: Distribution of educational level of respondents by stage of transition, Egypt
and Nepal ...........................................................................................................................41
Figure 5.4: Employers general skills assessment of young job applicants and young workers, by type of skill and overall general preparedness ..............................................................42
Boxes
Box 1: What is youth? .....................................................................................................................2
Box 2: ILO methodology for producing world and regional estimates of labour market indicators.......................6
Box 2.1: Why are youth unemployment rates higher than adult unemployment rates?...................19
Box 2.2: Inequalities in youth labour markets..................................................................................20
Box 3.1: What is poverty? ................................................................................................................23
Box 3.2: What is working poverty?..................................................................................................24
Box 3.3: Young girls and young refugees have the lowest chances to escape poverty....................27
See Press Release
New ILO study says youth unemployment rising, with hundreds of millions more working but living in poverty
Friday 27 October 2006 (ILO/06/48)
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/bureau/inf/pr/2006/48.htm
GENEVA (ILO News) - The number of unemployed youth aged 15 to 24 rose over the past decade, while hundreds of millions more are working but living in poverty, according to a new report by the International Labour Office (ILO)
AND MORE.....
______________________________
This information is provided to subscribers, friends, faculty, students and alumni of the School of Industrial & Labor Relations (ILR). It is a service of the Institute for Workplace Studies (IWS) in New York City. Stuart Basefsky is responsible for the selection of the contents which is intended to keep researchers, companies, workers, and governments aware of the latest information related to ILR disciplines as it becomes available for the purposes of research, understanding and debate. The content does not reflect the opinions or positions of Cornell University, the School of Industrial & Labor Relations, or that of Mr. Basefsky and should not be construed as such. The service is unique in that it provides the original source documentation, via links, behind the news and research of the day. Use of the information provided is unrestricted. However, it is requested that users acknowledge that the information was found via the IWS Documented News Service.
Stuart Basefsky
Director, IWS News Bureau
Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell/ILR School
16 E. 34th Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY 10016
Telephone: (607) 255-2703
Fax: (607) 255-9641
E-mail: smb6@cornell.edu
****************************************
# posted by SBasefsky : 11:23 AM
