Young people facing difficulties in labour market integration
A successful integration of young people into the labour market currently represents one of the main challenges for EU employment policy. Those who attempted to enter the labour market during the crisis were faced with very high unemployment rates and precarious jobs, and improvements in the situation of young people have been slow.
The share of NEETs (young people neither in employmentnor in education) in the EU28 population aged 15–24 amounted to 10.9% in 2017 (Figure 2.7). The best situation was noted in the Netherlands (4%), while the highest rateof NEETs was in Italy (20.1%) and Cyprus (16.1%). While participation in formal education is still high among 15–24-year olds, those aged 25–29 are for the most part striving to find employment. Accordingly, the NEET rate was much higher for this age group, with an average of 17.7% in the EU28. By far the highest rates were observed in Italy (31.5%) and Greece (32.2%).
more information in Benchmarking Working Europe 2019 - Chapter 2 Labour market and social developments