Moving abroad can be “a rational choice” for young Italians. This is the conclusion of the International Labor Organization-ILO in the report on youth employment, in the face of insufficient opportunities, wages and career prospects. The growth in employment has not been enough to make up for the delays in the Italian labor market where there are still almost four unemployed young people for every adult over 25 looking for work. Thus a country in the midst of a demographic crisis lost 367 thousand people between the ages of 25 and 34, between 2014 and 2023. Almost 40% are graduates. «For Italy it means losing the human capital necessary for innovation, productivity and development», warns the UN agency. There has been progress, especially in the reduction of NEETs, young people without employment and out of school and training courses, which have halved in the last decade from 25.7% to 13.3% but instability and underemployment are still widespread. In 2025, 31.3% of employees aged between 15 and 29 have a fixed-term contract and 61.4% work part-time because they have not found full-time positions. Heavy gaps penalize girls and young people in the South. The unemployment rate among 15-29 year olds is 14.4%, above the EU average (11.6%). “It is not enough to encourage entry into any occupation”, warns the ILO, “in a rapidly aging country, valorising the work of young people becomes essential”. For this reason “the success of policies should be measured above all on the basis of the ability to accompany young people towards a transition to dignified and sustainable work over time”.
The picture risks being worsened, in Italy as in other countries, by the spread of artificial intelligence. According to the ILO, “occupations that have traditionally represented a gateway to the job market for young people are decreasing”: office and administrative tasks, professions in the service and sales sectors, jobs linked to the manufacturing sector and some simple and repetitive technical professions risk being among the first to be automated. 6.1% of jobs occupied by young people between the ages of 15 and 29 concern professions highly exposed to changes related to artificial intelligence, at a global level, according to estimates. The risk is particularly relevant in advanced economies: in Europe almost 15% of young people’s employment would have a strong exposure to AI. At the same time, demand continues to grow in some knowledge-intensive technical professions, for example in science, health and engineering. If, by theoretical hypothesis, the 10% of the most exposed jobs disappeared, the report calculates that there would be 5.6 million potential employment transitions for young people in the world. 590 thousand in the European sub-region. The ILO specifies, however, that exposure does not equate to job loss: the outcomes depend on access to technology, the skills of workers and the organizational choices of companies. “There is more and more talk about artificial intelligence”, commented the director of the ILO’s Department for Employment, Skills and Sustainable Enterprises, Sukti Dasgupta, “although the direct impact on youth employment is not yet clear, we cannot afford to be complacent and underestimate the risks. We must step up investment in skills, lifelong learning and social protection, so that young people can adapt to change and seize new opportunities.” Prudence is all the more necessary in a job market for children that is slowing down internationally. In 2025, the global youth unemployment rate rose to 12.4% (67 million people), compared to 12.3% in 2023, while the NEET rate reached 20%, equal to 257 million young people. Some of the sharpest increases in youth unemployment were recorded by higher-income countries, starting with North America where the rate rose from 8.3% in 2023 to 9.8% in 2025. “A generation that cannot find a decent job cannot build its future with confidence,” underlined the director general of the ILO, Gilbert F. Houngbo.