Romanian NEETs: Barriers to Entry
into the Labor Market
Sorin Mitulescu, Ana Maria Dalu, Ancuţa Plăeşu,
Institute of Educational Sciences,
Bucharest, Romania
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Methodology
 Research methodology included qualitative field research (focus-groups
and in-depth interviews conducted in urban and rural areas with NEETs and
local and county stakeholders), but also statistical data analysis and
secondary analysis.
 The interviews analysis is focused on differences among NEETs point of view
and officials point of view for a better understanding of the true state of
affairs
Romanian NEET's Barriers to Entry into the Labor Market
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Who are the NEET’s ?
 this category of population is extremely heterogeneous.
 The NEETs’ most extensive subcategory in Europe / Romania consists of young
unemployed.
 Other subcategories:
 Early school leavers
 Young people with disabilities, those suffering from chronic illness
 young people who have left care institutions (after the age of 18)
 unconventional practitioners of liberal trades
 women who care for children or housewives
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Statistical data
 Young people in Romania have access later and to a lesser extent in the
labor market: ILO unemployment rate for the total population is under 7%,
while young people under 25 there is an alarming amount of 22.7%.
 Romania ranks the 5th among the countries with the highest rates of young
people NEET, after Italy, Bulgaria, Greece and Spain.
 NEET rate has seriously risen between 2008 and 2011(from 11.6% to 17.5%),
maintaining at approx. 17% in the period 2012-2014.
 Graduating higher education does not improve the chances of success in
the labor market.
Romanian NEET's Barriers to Entry into the Labor Market
Field results
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 The high rate of youth unemployment can not be explained entirely by
poverty of job offer
 Officials from local and specialized agencies estimated that there are enough
jobs and job opportunities available for young people.
 There are many jobs available in major cities in industry or commerce and
services, but rural areas are in a less favorable position, job offers being variable
depending from region to region. Working abroad is also -as that officials finds a tempting offer and profitable for youngsters.
 The opinion of young people on the opportunities available not yet entirely
coincide with the one of the officials. NEET young people see the demand for
jobs is low both in the city and especially in rural area and say they were forced
to serch for work for long periods
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What are the obstacles that hamper the transition
of young people looking for work into jobs
available in the labour market ?
 Obstacles:
 Salary (1)
 Jobs (2)
 The recruitment (3)
 Social context (4)
 Young people attitudes, values, skills (5)
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How to fiind a job ? (1)
 for 90% of Romanian young people finding a job is a problem or even a
serious problem . This percentage has increased in the recent years: in 2008
under 83% and in 2012 reached 87%.
 "friends or people you know" is the most important factor in finding a job.
Most NEET young people reported that the lack of personal relationships
and helpful staff members, is the main obstacle in employment. Their future
proffessional plans are based on family support. (parents, grandparents,
etc.)
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How to fiind a job ? (2)
 Family support:
 The family is the primary support system, but also the looming
social identity and system of benchmarks for youth.
 Relationships with family and close circle of relatives and friends
are defining how young people define themselves;
 The importance NEET young people attribute to these close
relationships, especially with family, outlines resources identified
to support them, within social capital bonding type in Putnam's
words;
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How to fiind a job ? (3)
 Suppoort provided by the authorities:
 Opinion polls results have shown public services plaing an extremely
limited role in helping (facilitating) young people to access the labor
market. NEET young people rarely address the authorities to find a job.
 Support for the employability of young people usualy only covers
limited offer of several training courses.
 But public services often feel overcome by the difficulty of the problems
faced by young people like the ones brought up in institutions, young
Roma, young mothers obviously discriminated.
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Education level
 NEET category is often deficient professionally, many of them even
with unfinished elementary education.
 But even those with more training have problems: 48% of students
surveyed felt that in Romania there are too many educated people
and they will not have a job because they are considered either too
qualified or trained in theory and inexperienced.
 Interviewed officials insisted the reason is the weaknesses in
preparation which creates problems in youth employment,
especially in qualifications for jobs without searching the job
market.
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Improving school, training, education help for youngsters to fiind a job ?
 If the school is perceived as responding to labor market needs in a
proportion of about 68%, the percentage of those who believe that
it responds to a small extent is increasing.
 young people we talked did not really take into account the
training option, although their age may be a premise. Continuous
training has not become a habit among young people. Many
people find it hard to go again "to school" once they become an
active person.
 Some officials, even have told us in interviews that they face
difficulties to convince young people to attend certain training
courses even though are offered free of charge.
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Public policy adressing NEET’s in Romania
 developing the Implementation Plan of Youth Guarantee was achieved
without real participation and consultation of non-governmental
organizations with expertise on this topic;
 the difficulty of identification and registration of NEETs is a major challenge
(NIS estimated in 2014 that about 70.000 unemployed young people were
registered in Public Employment Service while 450.000 were young
unregistered NEETs);
 the resource institution for the implementation of new OPHC (2014-2020) is
Public Employment Service, whose low performance was signalled both by
Romanian private and public organizations and by European institutions;
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Conclusions (1)
 Qualitative research conducted among young people NEET show a
marked lack of trust in people in general, the only instance invested
with increased confidence being family. Such distrust is a negative
prerequisite for any positive changes in Romania.
 Young problematic family backgrounds and communities /
disadvantaged social backgrounds are more at risk of becoming
NEET and overcome difficulty status.
 Segregation and low social economic status, other risks, such as
Roma ethnicity, represent important predictors of belonging to
NEETs.
 The concerns of most young people surveyed do not extend
beyond the near daily: access to financial resources necessary to
pursue outlines the aspirations of most young people lack the
financial support of the family home.
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Conclusions (2)
 The main courts relied with the support of young people in difficult
situations are their family and relatives.
 Institutions responsible for providing services to various social
groups, like local authorities, are seen rather as sources of material
aid for subsistence, than as sources of specialist support in difficult
situations
 The contacts and links among young people and public institutions
in the area of services, outlines the scope of bridging social capital
but are reduced and are based on personal relationships in the
family circle and close acquaintances, so that all of them is
originating in bonding type capital
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Conclusions (3)
 The perception of a society atomized, internalization of culture nonparticipation of social and community, poor configuration civic
competence subjective confidence generalized low and reduced
presence of social capital bridging, guiding individuals towards
social environment outside the family group, are traits that describe
youth in Romania general.
 These characteristics are more pronounced in young people NEET
profile, and combined with other risk factors affecting them, creates
preconditions for difficult overcoming the poor situation of social
exclusion in which most of them are placed.
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Recommendations for youth policy
 Services for young NEET should face distrust, lack of civic
participation and community involvement of these
young people.
 They should first win the trust of young people, to
practice personalized interventions and to focus on
counseling.
 In order to solve complex social and personal situations,
young people need complex support, custom
interlocutors and highly motivated professionals to help.
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Thank you for the
attention !
Romanian NEET's Barriers to Entry into the Labor Market