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Youth unemployment in the Arab world

The region’s youth is wasting away

By THE DATA TEAM

IN MOST places a large youthful population would be regarded as an economic blessing. But in the Arab world the young are treated, for the most part, as a curse to be suppressed. Faced with oppression and few opportunities, the region’s youth is wasting away.

The lack of opportunities in the Arab world has been exacerbated by a demographic boom. The region’s population doubled in the three decades after 1980, to 357m in 2010. It is expected to add another 110m people by 2025—an average annual growth rate of 1.8%, compared with 1% globally. In 2010 the proportion of Arabs aged 15-24 peaked at 20% of the total population. But the absolute number of young will keep growing, from 46m in 2010 to 58m in 2025. And the demographic stress is compounded by rapid urbanisation.

Moreover, for the young, jobs are few and far between. In 2010, on the eve of the Arab uprisings, total and youth unemployment rates in the Arab world were already the highest of any region, at 10% and 27% respectively. Since then these figures have risen further, to nearly 12% and 30%. Amazingly, in some Arab countries, the more time you spend in school, the less chance you have of finding a job. In Egypt 34% of university graduates were unemployed in 2014, compared with 2% of those with less than a primary education.

See the full article here.

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