A new 2026 report from the International Labour Organization (ILO) paints a sobering picture of the global youth labor market, revealing that worldwide youth unemployment climbed to 12.4% in 2025. This figure translates to roughly 67 million people between the ages of 15 and 24 locked out of formal work opportunities across the globe.
Beyond unemployment, the report *Global Employment Trends for Youth 2026: Back to the Future* finds that the share of young people classified as not in employment, education or training (NEET) has also ticked upward, reaching 20% — a rate that impacts more than 257 million young people globally. Between 2023 and 2025, youth unemployment rates grew in eight out of the world’s 11 geographic subregions, a trend driven by overlapping headwinds: slowing global economic expansion, stagnant private and public sector job creation, escalating geopolitical tensions, and the rapid disruption of labor markets by technological transformation.
ILO Director-General Gilbert F. Houngbo emphasized the far-reaching stakes of this ongoing crisis, noting that an entire generation locked out of dignified work cannot build stable, confident futures. When young people are systematically excluded from quality employment, he argued, nations do not just fail their populations — they lose critical talent, forego untapped economic productivity, and erode the social cohesion that supports long-term growth. Investing in decent work for young people, he added, is not merely a moral and social obligation: it is one of the highest-return investments any country can make.
Regional breakdowns in the report show that some of the steepest youth unemployment increases have occurred in higher-income economies. In Northern America, the youth jobless rate jumped from 8.3% in 2023 to 9.8% in 2025. Across Northern, Southern and Western Europe, the unemployment rate held steady at 15% overall, with nearly two-thirds of the region’s countries reporting shrinking employment opportunities for young first-time workers.
The report identifies a structural shift in labor demand as a key barrier to young people seeking stable careers: a steady decline in middle-skilled positions spanning clerical work, administrative roles, retail and service jobs, manufacturing positions, and many entry-level technical roles. This shift has squeezed young workers who once relied on these roles to launch their professional trajectories.
Developing economies, meanwhile, face a distinct set of challenges: most must generate massive numbers of new decent jobs to keep up with rapidly growing youth populations. In low- and lower-middle-income countries, nearly nine out of 10 young workers between 15 and 29 hold informal jobs, which rarely offer stable incomes or access to social protection systems. Sub-Saharan Africa contends with particularly intense demographic pressure, while the Arab States and Northern Africa posted the world’s highest youth unemployment rates in 2025 at 26.2% and 22.6% respectively. In both regions, at least one in three young people fall into the NEET category.
The report also devotes focused analysis to the growing impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on youth employment, estimating that 6.1% of jobs held by 15 to 29-year-olds face very high exposure to AI-driven labor market shifts.
Sukti Dasgupta, Director of the ILO’s Employment, Skills and Sustainable Enterprises Department, noted that public discourse around AI has grown increasingly loud and often polarizing. While the full direct impact of AI on total employment remains uncertain, Dasgupta warned against complacency and underestimating the disruptive risks the technology poses for young workers. To respond effectively, she said, nations must ramp up investment in accessible skills training, lifelong learning frameworks, and expanded social protection to equip young people to adapt to rapid change and capitalize on new opportunities. Crucially, Dasgupta emphasized that technological progress including AI must be structured to work for young people, not against their economic interests.
To address the overlapping challenges facing the global youth labor market, the ILO is calling for a coordinated, multi-pronged policy response: human-centred governance of AI that prioritizes worker well-being, expanded access to robust education and apprenticeship opportunities, improved public employment services to connect young people to open roles, broader social protection coverage, and targeted macroeconomic policies designed to grow the number of decent work opportunities.
Above all, the report stresses that the end goal is not simply creating more jobs of any kind. The priority must be delivering work that offers young people financial security, human dignity, and a clear, meaningful pathway to stable adulthood.