Crisis in youth without work

Press, 30 July 1980, Page 16

Crisis in youth without work

By

John Palmer of

the “Guardian”

Could it be among the

young unemployed that tolerance for the Western world’s slide from stagflation to something like slumpflation snaps first? To judge by the

latest world economic survey published by the Organisation for Economic Co-

operation and Development in Paris early this month, young people are carrying a disproportionate share of the economic sacrifices resulting from the deepening world economic crisis.

The normally staid O.E.C.D. — sometimes described as the “club of the most privileged capitalist economies” — comes as close as protocol permits to warning Western governments that they are sitting on top of a potential social and political time-bomb as youth unemployment grows. The prediction the O.E.C.D. makes for the coming 12 months will certainly challenge the somnolence of most Western governments faced with a rising tide of workless young. Referring to the onset of a new world recession and the general increase in the numbers of unem-

ployed, the O.E.C.D. report states: “The effects will be ' felt particularly severely by young people whose unemployment rates are likely to reach levels which constitute a serious social problem.” Even after excluding school leavers and adult students

from its projections, the O.E.C.D. predicts that the rate of unemployment among the young will rise next year to 13 per cent. The figure for the United States will he 16 per cent (where it-will be concentrated * among black and Chicano youth) and 16| per cent in France where memories of the way youth protest triggered the general strike of workers in 1968 are bound to stir uneasily. Of al! the Western industrialised countries, it is in Britain where the sharpest increase: in the numbers of young unemployed is awaited. The United Kingdom youth unemployment rate is expected to jump to 14 per cent in 1981, compared with 10} per cent this year and 8 per cent last .year. The reasons for the par-

ticularly worrying surge of youth unemployment in the United Kingdom are fairly straight-forward. The drop In output over the next year threatens to be bigger than in almost any other Western economy.

But the baby boom of the early 1960 s has, in Britain’s case, still got to work its way through the labour market. In some other countries, such as Canada and Japan, the crisis of joblessness among the young is only mitigated by the fact that the demographic curve is .pointing down and the number of young people reaching working age is actually- declining. The O.E.C.D. study also reveals that the pattern of hardship is affected by sex. Teenage girls generally fare much worse in the scramble for what jobs are going than do boys. . Indeed the- O.E.C.D. calculates that unemployment among teen-age . girls in France and Italy is already running at about 40 per cent. The length of time a young person can expect to be without a job is also increasing rapidly in several countries, while the ratio of unemployed youth to unemployed adults is widening. It is now 1 to 6 in West European countries as varied as Italy and Norway and the O.E.C.D. says that, in terms of the sheer scale of the problem. Italy and Spain have by far the worst problem. Only in Austria and Switzerland is the problem described as “virtually nonexistent.”

The 0.E.C.D.. identifies three main reasons why the problem of youth unemployment should have reached such crisis proportions. The bame is put on: “sluggish economic, growth” (in good times) and deepening recession (as at present); the continuing effects of the baby boom and the fact that “the competitive position of young people in the labour market is significantly weaker than.that of other age groups.” ‘ 4 • The. last point is something which shoujd be taken on. board in all its, implications by the trade union movement... Since the last economic recession, which

began in 1973, the trade unions (and nowhere more than in Britain) have traded concessions on the hiring of apprentices and other young workers — dressed up as "productivity bargaining” — to finance wage awards. Many trade unions have simply washed their hands of any responsibility for the lengthening dole queue of teen-agers. Not surprisingly the O.E.C.D. does not attempt to give its report any optimistic conclusion. It is far from sure when and how vigo rously the capitalist world will pull out of recession and inflation. Certainly there is no shortage of economists who fear that even if the world economy starts to turn up next year, it will probably relapse into another bout of slumpflation.

It is more surprising that the cause of . the young enemployed has been largely ignored by the British and European socialist and trade union movements. That may explain the outbursts of political violence among the “marginale” (the youth outcasts) in Italy, Britain, and much of Western Europe. If that trend continues it can only have (fisturbingconsequences.