January 25, 2023
1. It seems that despite the reduction in recent years, youth unemployment is still a pending issue compared to more developed European countries. What are the causes? How do you think this challenge should be addressed?
Unemployment data is collinear with another figure in which we unfortunately also stand out negatively at a European level: early school leaving, which is around 15%. I believe this is the main cause. We have evidence that unskilled young people are not being hired, especially if they are under 20 years old.
This past December, for example, there were nearly 25,000 young people under the age of 25 registered as unemployed and looking for work, 65% of whom do not have post-compulsory education. To this statistic, we must add that, according to EPA data, there are more than 70,000 unemployed young people of this age who are not registered with the SOC.
Therefore, if we agree that one of the main causes of high youth unemployment is early school leaving and, consequently, the low or non-existent qualifications of young people, the challenge is to promote professional qualifications. And it undoubtedly is, when on the other hand companies, and certain sectors in particular, are currently having real difficulties finding qualified personnel.
The way to combat early school leaving and encourage qualifications would consist of deploying the full range of measures that are already known but have not yet been sufficiently implemented. These include providing good guidance and support during secondary education (ESO), seeking personalized and comprehensive care and support for young people throughout all their life transitions, promoting professional vocations with high demand, offering less academic and more professionalizing learning models, offering new opportunity programs for guidance and learning as established pathways in the training offer rather than compensatory measures, or strengthening the policy of scholarships and grants, among others.
We must not forget that school leaving also has a clear correlation with social vulnerability, which is why any social policy will be an element that contributes to reducing youth unemployment.
2. What is your assessment of the labor reform and its impact on youth employment?
I do not yet have a reflected analysis, but it is clear that stability has improved. Last month, a third of young people under 25 were hired through a permanent contract, whereas a year ago this figure barely reached 10% of contracts.
However, we note that the types of contracts designed for young people have not yet been deployed as they should be, despite having been subject to reform. Alternating training contracts and internship contracts remain anecdotal, and most likely companies are still not familiar with them. And they are crucial: the first because it is an excellent formula for offering dual training to young people who already have the skills to combine learning with work dedication, and the second because it is the way to acquire a first professional experience in a market that often demands it first. On the part of the SOC, these modalities are being promoted like never before, although there is still much to be done.
3. Last year, the SOC invested 125 million euros in subsidizing the hiring of unemployed young people under 30. What has been the impact of this investment?
The impact in terms of program execution is that, so far, contracts for more than 5,300 young people and companies have been subsidized. The question is whether this investment has triggered the hiring of young people by companies that would not have hired without this aid. With this objective, the SOC has planned a careful evaluation of this program to determine to what extent this has happened, among other analyses.
It is well known that hiring subsidy policies carry a high risk of incurring what we call the ‘deadweight effect’; meaning that, in reality, the aid has not been a lever to decide or condition the hiring, but rather that it would have happened anyway. However, it is also true that this risk is reduced in contexts of crisis, an exception that AIREF’s own reports recognize. It is also worth noting that this investment was designed in the midst of the pandemic, at a time of collapse that especially affected certain sectors of economic activity, and therefore it is also conceived through a lens of economic reactivation and stimulus.
In this program, however, what we mentioned before was confirmed: the lack of commitment to the internship contract modality. This modality is positive by nature, as it is the way to offer a first work experience in what has been studied. Every young person who finishes a vocational training certificate (CP), cycle, or degree should be able to access this modality if they do not have a better option.
4. Last year, a dual training program was executed for the first time within the framework of active employment policies. What is your assessment of it?
Extraordinary. In the edition of the FPODUAL program to be executed during 2023, 95 projects have been awarded, which will involve the training and hiring of more than 1,300 young people in nearly 600 companies, essentially SMEs and micro-enterprises.
This program is being the engine to extend alternating training (dual) contracts for young people among small businesses. Projects are taking place in absolutely strategic sectors such as installations, the food industry, logistics, social and health care, or the forestry sector.
At this moment, it is providing an answer to young people who need a job and want to obtain a qualification, to companies that need qualified personnel, and to sectors and territories that want to boost themselves.
5. Autoocupació’s motto is “I am what I want to be.” And you, are you?
I would say no. It’s like that phrase ‘traveler, there is no path, the path is made by walking’; I would rather say that I am ‘under construction.’ What ‘I want to be’ is always a pending goal. From a professional point of view, for example, the aspiration would be to be part of a public service model that successfully addresses the challenges we have been discussing, and we still have work to do.
