When youth rhymes with exclusion

By Sergio Ferrari - One in four young people will be neither employed nor able to study by 2025. The exclusion of a large part of young people challenges global society. There are more than 260 million young people between the ages of 14 and 24 worldwide who make up the NEET category, that is, those who are not working, not studying, and are unable to undertake any type of vocational or craft training. The trend is worrying and growing. According to the International Labour Organization (ILO) 2024 report, in 2023, NEETs represented one in five young people in the world, or 20,4%. Meanwhile, gender discrimination continues: the global NEET rate for young women doubled that of their male counterparts in 2023 (28,1% and 13,1%, respectively).https://www.ilo.org/es/node/666121).

By being excluded from the labor market and the world of education, NEETs reflect the complex trend of obstacles to youth integration into the world of work. In a recent article published by the ILO, Niall O'Higgins, one of its leading researchers, attempts to clarify the concept of NEETs in simple terms. It includes "all unemployed young people who are not studying, as well as a much larger group of young people who are unemployed and not participating in any formal training activity, but who, for one reason or another, are also not actively seeking work."

O'Higgins explains that, while the NEET rate is by no means a perfect indicator of how youth labor markets behave, "it's difficult to imagine a single indicator that is or could be." According to the researcher, the NEET rate is more appropriate for measuring this behavior than the traditional youth unemployment rate that was previously used and continues to be used in many official studies and statistics.

In this sense, O'Higgins says, "the proportion of NEETs in the population is a more informative indicator of the magnitude of the challenge represented by youth employment." The number of NEET youth is greater than that of their unemployed peers. Most of them are young women, and a large proportion would like to work but are not actively seeking employment, either due to lack of availability, scarcity of jobs, or because other obstacles, such as family care responsibilities, prevent them from aspiring to integrate into the formal world of work. In 2015, the United Nations adopted as objective number 8, section 6 of the Millennium Development Goals for combating poverty the substantial reduction in the NEET rate. This means that this rate is the instrument through which progress towards the effective integration of young people into the world of work can be assessed internationally. Taking this criterion into account, according to the ILO researcher, "to date, progress has been quite modest."

In this context, O'Higgins emphasizes that NEET status is a more reliable indicator than the concept of unemployment for analyzing social vulnerability or fragility. In contexts where access to social protection is limited or nonexistent, young people can only afford to be unemployed while seeking reasonable job opportunities if their families have the resources to support them. The poorest and most vulnerable young people cannot afford this "luxury." Even in high-income countries, NEET youth, outside the labor market, are at greater risk of long-term economic and social exclusion. This reality is exacerbated in the case of young women with caregiving responsibilities, that is, those who dedicate themselves to the care of elderly, minor, or sick relatives.

With the revision of international employment statistics, the condition for being considered employed is receiving remuneration. This means that young people who perform unpaid work, such as subsistence farming, are not considered active in the labor market and, consequently, if they do not attend any form of education, are identified as NEET (Not in Education, Employment, or Training).https://www.ilo.org/es/resource/articulo/medir-lo-importante-los-nini-frente-al-desempleo-juvenil#:~:text=La%20OIT%20estima%20que%20en,estudian%20ni%20siguen%20una%20formaci%C3%B3n).

Latin America and youth marginalization

In Latin America, coinciding with global statistics, one in four young people between the ages of 18 and 24 neither study nor have a paid job. Of this total, more than 70% are women dedicated exclusively to domestic care. According to the ILO, youth informality rates in Latin America reach nearly 60%, compared to 47,5% for adults, while young people's income represents 60% of adults' income.https://www.ilo.org/sites/default/files/2025-02/Informe%20juventud%20en%20cambio%202025.pdfIn turn, in November 2024, the Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLAC) published the Prospective Study of Youth Employment in Latin AmericaThe same study concludes that the outlook until 2030 is not very optimistic: "the trend of young people moving from agriculture and manufacturing to the service sector will continue." According to ECLAC, within a realistic scenario that includes data from 16 countries in the region (and considering only the increase in the high school completion rate as a strategic variable in the prospective analysis), more than 1,2 million young people would leave the agricultural sector, about 640 would leave the manufacturing sector, and more than 1,8 million would enter the service sector, which, in the region, is characterized by low levels of labor productivity. If this trend is confirmed, there will be a degradation in the quality and productivity of youth work. These numbers may increase due to the intensification of internal migration as a result of climate change and the reconfiguration of intraregional migration. According to the ECLAC study, if measures are not implemented to anticipate these changes, the number of young people seeking work may exceed existing demand, especially in urban areas. Furthermore, the gap between supply and demand could widen due to automation processes, a serious risk faced particularly by the young population. This situation would impact higher unemployment levels in this age group and the growth of the informal sector. (https://repositorio.cepal.org/server/api/core/bitstreams/846790fb-eb41-41b3-ba0a-e7dd80347bd7/content);

Europe is not doing any better.

It's not just NEETs who pay the price of marginalization in developing countries. In high-income nations and regions, young people also experience daily blows to their aspirations for social advancement. In the second week of August, a report by the Union of Workers' Commissions (CCOO) in Spain painted a shocking picture of the situation in that European country. According to the union, young people earn 25% less than the national average; 43% worked without formal contracts, and one in three is at risk of falling into poverty or social exclusion. The report presents a grim retrospective assessment and concludes that young people currently earn 20% less than "our parents earned at our age."

Pau García Orrit, Confederal Secretary for Youth of the CCOO, states: "Although significant progress has been made in recent years in the field of youth employment – ​​improvements in access to employment and working conditions, even in a context marked by successive crises and exceptional situations – structural precariousness continues to profoundly affect the lives of young people in Spain." Although youth unemployment has fallen to historic lows, the Iberian country continues to occupy first place in youth precariousness in Europe. This situation has been aggravated by a no less worrying phenomenon: 85% of young people continue to live with their parents. "Access to affordable rent has become an odyssey, and emancipation is an increasingly distant horizon. Buying a house is impossible for most young people."

The union center warns that the present, lacking stability or certainty, has transformed youth into a category increasingly devoid of meaning. Being young today is no longer a stage in which one learns to build a life project, but is synonymous with insecurity, precariousness, and a lack of expectations. A youth "emptied of real content." (https://www.ccoo.es/noticia:734394--La_juventud_no_se_rinde_Jovenes_CCOO_exige_respuestas_para_una_situacion_de_emergencia&opc_id=8c53f4de8f8f09d2e54f19daf8d8ed95).

The precariousness of youth employment and education continues to be a scourge with profound social repercussions. Although it mainly affects countries in the Global South, it is not limited to this geographical area. Ten European countries have youth unemployment rates ranging from 19% to 25%. Spain and Romania lead, with one or one young person in every four unemployed, closely followed by Sweden. Meanwhile, Finland, Italy, Belgium, Portugal, and France have about one in five. Youth exclusion, therefore, appears almost as the norm in a world increasingly governed by adult men.

Translation: Rose Lima.