(The Daily Beast) — How can the world avoid an explosion of youth protests in the coming years when we are already experiencing an epidemic of youth unemployment today? And how can our generation—who fared better than our parents—begin to understand what it feels like for the coming generation who already fear they will do worse?
The global arithmetic of youth unemployment makes for frightening reading: the 81 million young people who are today out of work now make up the majority of the world’s unemployed. Young people are two-and-a-half-times more likely to be out of work than their adult counterparts. Youth unemployment has now reached a staggering 50 percent in Egypt and Tunisia, has risen above 40 percent in Spain and Italy, and is approaching similar figures in Africa. Even oil-rich Saudi Arabia is suffering its worst ever rise in joblessness among young people. Across the West, in both America and Europe, official youth unemployment rates already exceed 20 percent. Another 350 million will be added to the global workforce by 2020.
Full story: Give the kids jobs!