Un: Euro Crisis To Worsen Youth Unemployment Worldwide

[News_Editor]

UN: Euro crisis to worsen youth unemployment worldwide < br />

2012-09-05 21:31:20 GMT+7 (ICT)

NEW YORK (BNO NEWS) -- The effects of the euro crisis is expected to further increase unemployment among young people in emerging economies in upcoming years, the United Nations (UN) said in a report released on Tuesday, noting that youth unemployment is expected to fall in developed economies.

The UN International Labour Organization (ILO) forecasts the youth unemployment rate in developed economies to drop gradually, from 17.5 percent this year to 15.6 percent in 2017. But the youth unemployment will remain far higher than the 12.5 percent registered in 2007, before the crisis began.

And despite the decline in the jobless rate, ILO points out that this is not due to improvements in the labor market, but rather to large numbers of young people who are dropping out of the labor force altogether due to discouragement. These discouraged youth are not counted among the unemployed.

"Ironically, only in developed economies are youth unemployment rates expected to fall in the coming years, but this follows the largest increase in youth unemployment among all regions since the start of the crisis," said Ekkehard Ernst, the lead author of the paper, which is titled "Global Employment Outlook: Bleak Labor Market Prospects for Youth."

A previous ILO report, released in May, noted that employment rates have increased in only six of the 36 advanced economies since 2007 - Austria, Germany, Israel, Luxembourg, Malta and Poland - and that youth unemployment rates have increased in about 80 percent of advanced countries and two-thirds of developing countries.

Tuesday's ILO report said young people are three times more likely to be unemployed when compared to adults, and over 75 million youth worldwide are currently looking for work. The agency underlined that the impact of the euro crisis is expected to expand well beyond Europe, affecting economies in East Asia and Latin America as exports to advanced economies have faltered.

In North Africa and the Middle East, youth unemployment rates are projected to remain above 25 percent over the next years and might even rise further in parts of these regions. Previously the labor agency warned of a 'scarred' generation of young workers who are facing a dangerous mix of high unemployment, increased inactivity and precarious work in developed countries, as well as persistently high working poverty in the developing world.

With the global youth unemployment rate expected to reach 12.9 percent by 2017, the figure shows an increase of 0.2 percentage points from forecasts for 2012. ILO in June adopted a resolution which called for immediate, targeted and renewed action to tackle the global youth unemployment crisis.

-- © BNO News All rights reserved 2012-09-05