Record number of jobless youth says the ILO

Another sign of how few available jobs are out there comes from a report from the International Labor Organization. The ILO says that the jobless rate for youth is at an all time high. 81 million people young people were without jobs in 2008. The ILO defines the young as those between the ages of 15 and 21. Of course, the ILO blames the global recession for the record high.

From the Australian Broadcasting Company, we read more about the ILO report from writer Karon Snowdon.

The global unemployment rate for youth is 13 per cent, eight million higher than at any other time and still rising.

Forty-five per cent of the increase has occurred in Europe, which is more dependent on the officially classified "formal" sector.

In developing countries, with little or no social security safety net, people have no choice but to work at any job they can find. Some can return to family farming to get by.

But the crisis in developing countries like Cambodia, Nepal and parts of India is expressed in already bad work conditions and wages getting worse and deepening extreme poverty.

ILO economist Kee Beom Kim says more than 150 million young people work but never break out of the poverty trap.