National Minimum Wage

Chapter 3: Young People, Interns and Apprentices
18-21), with basic hours reduced by 3-4 hours during the recession. They do, however,
caution that these results were based on small sample sizes.
3.36 In response to our consultation, many stakeholders touched on the difficult labour market
conditions facing young people. The Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals was
pessimistic about the employment opportunities for young people given the state of the
labour market; and the manufacturers’ organisation, EEF, reported fewer opportunities for
young people, following the abolition of the default retirement age, as an increased number
of people over state-pension age would remain in work.
3.37 To complete the picture of how young people are
engaging with the labour market, we look at those
“The majority of young people
young people who become NEET, alongside those succeed in education and make
who enter employment or those who remain in FTE. a positive transition to adult
We use data from the LFS to define NEETs as those life and the world of work. But
who are unemployed or inactive but are not: students; we face a very real challenge in
on a course; working towards a qualification;
or undertaking an apprenticeship.
terms of opportunities for young
people, with 1.16 million young
3.38 During a recession, the proportion of young people people in England aged 16-24
who are NEET might be expected to rise, as
not in education, employment
employers stop hiring new staff and make
redundancies. However, Figure 3.7 shows that for
or training (NEET).”
16-17 year olds, the NEET rate (the proportion of the Government written evidence
population who are NEET) has continued to fall since
the recession began; dropping from 6.5 per cent in the
second quarter of 2008 to 5.1 per cent by the third
2011
quarter of 2011. As mentioned above this appears to be due in part to some 16-17 year olds
remaining in education during the recession to avoid becoming unemployed. In contrast, the
NEET rates for both 18-20 year olds and 21-24 year olds have slowly increased since 2005,
and have shown a marked rise since the start of the recession.
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