Youth unemployment and the ‘lost generation’

This interview with Guy Ryder, the newly elected Director of the United Nation’s International Labour Organisation, explores what the ILO can do to address youth unemployment in Europe. Currently one in five young people in the EU are said to be unable to find a job and in some countries youth unemployment is over 40%.

He talks about the risks of a ‘lost generation’, a term we have seen widely used in the context of youth unemployment since the start of the recession. He describes the rhetoric of this phrase as being accurate and goes on to invoke the possibility of multiple ‘lost generations‘.

It’s an interesting example of how a particular term takes hold.