European leaders met today for the specific purpose of discussing issues of youth unemployment in the region. And, while rates well over 25% have been seen in troubled peripheral economies since 2009...
It is interesting to note that the proportion of youth unemployment to total unemployment is much higher in some of the Nordic countries (as well as France) than it is in Portugal, Spain, or Greece. In the extremes, Germany's overall unemployment (5.2%) is not that much lower than joblessness among younger citizens (7.7%). Meanwhile, Italy's 40.4% youth unemployment rate is about 3x its overall rate of 12.5%.