Engaging young people in the labour market and society isn't just about their individual economic success and well-being - it's also about driving overall economic growth and fostering social cohesion. By enhancing their skills, boosting employment opportunities, and crafting supportive social policies, young people have the opportunity to fulfill their potential and future career prospects.
Employability
Improving employability is crucial for well-being, economic growth and social cohesion. This is especially important for groups facing labour market challenges, such as young people seeking entry into the workforce, older people whose skills could lose relevance and migrants experiencing difficulties finding work and integrating into society. Targeted approaches to improve the employability of such groups is vital.
Key messages
In many countries people are living longer and healthier lives than ever before. While this is good news for individuals, it poses a challenge for societies to provide for rising numbers of retirees, with the larger financial burden falling on younger generations. Giving people better choices and incentives to continue working at an older age is crucial for responding to the challenges of rapid population ageing.
Integration of immigrants and, increasingly, their native-born descendants, is crucial for reaping benefits of migration, and for social cohesion. A starting point is to take stock of the characteristics and integration outcomes of immigrants and their children.
Jointly produced with the European Union, the OECD hosts the largest database to date on the characteristics and outcomes of immigrants and their children. It also monitors integration policies across the OECD, along with examples of good practice. Specific topical work combines the two, for example for specific groups such as refugees, migrant women, youth with immigrant parents, and cross-cutting policy issues such as discrimination, geographical segregation, language training, and qualification transferability.
Context
Skills development for older workers
Persistent inequalities in the availability and take-up of training mean that older workers are frequently left without the right skills to flourish over longer working lives. On average in the EU, only 35% of adults aged 55-64 participated in formal or non-formal job-related training in the last 12 months compared to 48% for those aged 35-54 years old. This ranges from over 60% of older workers in Sweden to less than 10% in Greece and Türkiye. The low level of participation in training by older workers is a major problem for firms as it leads to lower productivity and the loss of experience as older workers’ skills become obsolete and they exit the workforce.
Youth unemployment
Youth unemployment rates are typically higher than the unemployment rates of older people, even in times of economic growth, because young people tend to have less work experience and a more limited professional network to rely on for their job search.
Economic downturns, such as the global financial crisis in 2009 and the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, also tend to have a strong impact on young people’s ability to find or stay in work. They are often the first ones to lose their jobs during such downturns as they are more likely to have temporary contracts and fewer company-specific skills.
Individual characteristics, such as low education, economic hardship, migration background, and health or social problems can also pose additional challenges for them to enter and remain in employment.
Employment of immigrants
Integration is vital to ensure the ability of migrants to function as autonomous, productive and successful members of society. It is also critical for the acceptance of migration by the host country population at a time when immigration and integration are among the main issues of concern in public opinion in many countries. Having reliable facts is a prerequisite for a better informed public debate.
For example, immigrant populations have become more educated over the past decade and in 2022 their OECD-wide employment rates reached the highest level on record.
