9058009792

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Hartmann. Sweden

5. The Outcome ofJYouth Employment Measures

From a merely statistical point of view, the result of the Swedish measures to curb youth unemploytnent and to keep young people in an acceptable social environment has been very successful. According to OECD-reports Sweden. along with‘Norway and Switzerland. was one of the few OECD-countries (not considering Luiembourg and Island), where unemployment in generał was below 2.5% and where youth accounted for only 8* of the unemployed. as compared with youth unemployment amounting to 69% of total unemployment in Belgium, 48% in France. 32% in the FRG and 41% in the UK.(DN 87-10-01)

Yet, official statistics can only give a distorted view of reality as methods of defining and counting unemployment differ between the countries and. even morę aggravating for an interpretation, the societal background and basis of eyaluation of certain statistical data are not available. Therefore, I will try to eyaluate the outcome of the Swedish employment measures di-rected towards young people by reflecting the Swedish debate on the ef-fects of youth policies.

5.h-Cpntmued j?duęatiQn:.W.areJłQuse oLsualification for.lhgiuture labour

market?

The rise of enrolments in secondary education from 75% in 1975 to 97% in 1984 was predominantly motivated by the need of a morę skilled labour force meeting the needs of the technological revolution in the futurę econ-omy. But in reality. prolonged secondary training - especially in the shorter two-year programmes with yocational training - has become an alternative to overt unemployment. While it is impossible to ąuantify the size of "pull-effects'¹ in detail, the attractiveness of secondary training becomes ques-tionable when compared to "push-effects", i.e. the lack of acceptable alter-natives. The statement of 44% of youth in secondary training that they would leave school immediately, if they could obtain gainful employment. is an indicator for the warehouse or parking-space effect of secondary training in Sweden.

According to Adler-Karlsson (1983) it is an irony that just in a situation where distinct job careers are difficult to find and the futurę of employment opportunities is difficult to forecast even for specialists, young people are predominantly forced into specialized training. Instead of using the time of prolonged schooling for developing personal skills and to prepare young people to find a personal coping strategy for the problems of change and insecurity in society, they are forced into a rigid training program me