‘Stark reality’: More schooling doesn’t equal more work for young Aussies
YOUNG Australians are better educated than ever but the stark reality is that half of 25-year-olds cannot get a full-time job.
YOUNG Australians are better educated than ever, but half of 25-year-olds can’t get a full-time job, a new study reveals.
Three in five young adults have post-school qualifications, but it’s becoming harder to find 35 hours’ work a week, research from the Foundation for Young Australians found.
The New Work Reality report followed 14,000 young people over a decade and exposed an increasing issue — the number of people working full-time hours in casual jobs has doubled over two decades.
FYA chief executive Jan Owen said it was a “stark reality” young people were better educated and more invested in their education but “that golden ticket has not led to full-time work for 50 per cent of 25-year-olds right now”.
“That one experience, that one degree, is clearly very much not the golden ticket,” she said.
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Three in four young people don’t believe they have the relevant experience for the job market, the study found.
A negative mindset was also a problem.
Being optimistic accelerated the transition to full-time work by two months compared to those who were unhappy or lacked confidence.
Barriers to full-time work were also identified, including a lack of jobs, appropriate education, career management and work experience.
Meanwhile, the average transition time from education to work was almost five years, compared to just one year in 1986 — or 2.6 years after removing travel, gap years and part-time education.
Ms Owen said it was “a very dire situation to be in” with work prospects having an economic and social impact on young people.
“On the other side, it’s great to know there are four things that can accelerate a transition to work,” she said.
As well as optimism, teaching enterprise skills accelerated getting a full-time job by 17 months, combining study and work by a year and finding a job in areas with strong future prospects by five months.
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