Last year, 39 percent of young men and 27 percent of young women were employed. Compared to their counterparts in the rest of the EU, they speak more languages, and they have an above-average rate of enrolling in tertiary education. On the negative side of the spectrum, they are near the top in terms of the percent living with their parents and in the share of part-time employment.

Employment happens to be the root cause of many problems that have a negative effect on their social status. Among young people, the status improved by 0.7 percentage points last year compared to the year before. However, the risk of poverty has remained constant at 14.7 percent, and is higher than among the general population.

"This risk depends on the status of young people in the labor market. We, young people, tend to have a hard time finding our first employment. At the same time, while we are in the labor market, we face insecure, part-time work which reduces our social and economic security," says Tin Kampl, the president of the National Youth Council.

Not everyone is willing to change
In order to improve the status of young people, youth representatives believe that thorough changes need to be made: more scholarship need to be given out, income tax breaks for students need to be raised, and long-term measures need to join short-term ones in the labor market.

Several stiff challenges remain in the area of employment, admits the Director of the Office for Youth, Peter Debeljak. But it's not all up to the state, he adds: "I've witnessed several instances in which the government tried to improve these matters, but there was too little understanding from some social partners. I have the feeling that the final step was more problematic for society at large than the government."

Society has always had an ambivalent attitude towards young people, but these days, it seems that it has abandoned them, says social psychologist Mirjana Ule. The Millennial generation has adapted itself to the conditions and the times it lives in. It is more pragmatic when it comes to attaining goals. "If they have no work-related opportunities, they redirect their potential and their creativity to other areas," says Ule. She adds that young people today tend to have more short-term goals because the word around them no longer allows them to have long-term ones. The top of their hierarchy of values no longer consists of work and money, but rather quality of life.

Š. Š., RA SLO
Translated by J.B.