Fears for lost generation of jobless youth
Date
June 30, 2013
Latest Australian Bureau of Statistics figures show job vacancies have fallen in 15 out of 18 industries.
Australia is running the risk of creating its own European-style ''lost generation'' of youth, with unemployment rates for young people in some parts of Melbourne and Sydney running at almost four times the national average.
In Melbourne's outer west, one in five people aged between 15 and 24 are trying to find work. Lucas Walsh, associate dean at Monash University's education faculty, said it was deplorable given Australia's stable economy.
''Youth unemployment is at an unacceptable level,'' he said. ''The reason why it's unacceptable is … we are in the longest period of unbroken economic growth we have experienced in this country. Adult unemployment is extremely low. Are these employment opportunities being passed on to teenagers? No, they are not.''
He said cuts to vocational education and training organisations had reduced employment options for young people.
Further, those in disadvantaged areas do not have the same social or professional connections as those in wealthier suburbs. The youth unemployment rate in Sydney's east is only 4.1 per cent, while Canterbury-Bankstown in the west is the city's worst-affected area, with an unemployment rate of 19.1 per cent for people aged 15-24. The national youth unemployment rate is 11.6 per cent, compared with a national unemployment rate of 5.5 per cent.
Phil Lewis, of the University of Canberra's Centre for Labour Market Research, said the concentration of young unemployed was concerning.
''The reason youth unemployment is concentrated in particular suburbs is because these young people tend to live with their parents,'' he said. ''There are often higher levels of unemployment among the parents and lower levels of education. In the richer suburbs there is a culture. The parents were probably well-educated. The expectation is that young people will go on to further study.''
Changes to Australia's job market mean blue-collar jobs such as manufacturing are declining.
''People without skills may have been able to get a job in a factory or on the railways in the past but those jobs don't exist any more,'' he said. ''With the structural change to the economy you really have to have an education to get into the labour market.''
Latest Australian Bureau of Statistics figures show job vacancies have fallen in 15 out of 18 industries. More than 687,700 Australians were looking for work last month, up from 624,900 in May 2012. In Victoria, there were five unemployed for every vacancy. ''It's a complex problem,'' said Damian Oliver, of Sydney University's Workplace Research Centre. ''It's important to boost post-school education and training, so there needs to be investment at that level but that doesn't create jobs. It doesn't do much for those young people who are starting from much further behind and don't have those direct pathways into work.''
The long-term unemployed are at risk of ending up like the ''lost generation'' of Europe's jobless youth, he said.
''The reason why youth unemployment is such an urgent policy issue is that if young people miss the opportunity of a good start in the labour market, it just gets harder and harder every day, every week, every month, every year they can't get their first job and get that foothold.''
Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/national/fears-for-lost-generation-of-jobless-youth-20130629-2p465.html#ixzz2XdqjvqaZ
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