“No Work” for One out of Four in 15~29 Age Group

It is reported that one out of four 15~29 aged youth doesn`t have job.

According to `Structural change of youth labor market` that researcher of Korea Labor Institute, Lee Byung-hee reported on 18th, the unemployed youth were 1,329,000 combining with 242,000 idle youth and 1,087,000 jobless people who aren`t trained for job and are not educated. It is 25.4% of those who graduated school or dropped out of school.

Idle human resources means those who don`t carry out economic activity such as people who are not able to get job despite of desire for job, or jobless people who are not educated or trained for job after finishing formal school education, or those who don`t have mind to work and housewives, etc.

Gender rate of idle human resources makes up 31.8%(960 thousand) of female, which is two times higher than the males, which are 16.7%(369 thousand) of male.

In case of jobless people not unemployed people, women replied for the reason such as childcare (51.9%), household affairs (36%), preparing for job (4%), preparation for study (1.7%), etc and men replied such as preparation for job (23.9%), household affairs (23.9%), waiting for military service (8.7%), preparation for study (8%), etc.

Ratio that youth occupies in a company which has more than 300 workers are experiencing a decline like 43.5% in 1996, 42.3% 1997, 38.8% 1998, 36.4% 1999, 35.4% 2000, 32.2% 2001.

Sang-Keun Song songmoon@donga.com