Eleven percentage points of separation: this is how much the difference in the employment rate between Italian graduates and diploma holders amounts to. The data comes from the latest Istat report and highlights that, between 25 and 64 years old, 84.3% of the former work compared to 75.4% of the latter.
The report “Education levels and employment returns, year 2023”, also highlights how the gap between the two education groups rises to 15.7 points among those under 35 who obtained their qualification one to three years earlier (75.4% and 59.7%). Compared to 2022, the employment data linked to the educational qualification therefore remain substantially unchanged.
In 2023, among those with a tertiary qualification, the employment rate reaches 84.3%, a value 11 percentage points higher than that of those with an upper secondary qualification (73.3%) and 30 percentage points higher than to those who have obtained at most a lower secondary qualification (54.1%).
The unemployment rate of graduates, equal to 3.6%, is significantly lower than that of high school graduates (6.2%) and that of those with low qualifications (10.7%). “It is therefore confirmed – writes Istat – the obvious employment ‘premium’ of educationin terms of increase in the share of employed people as the qualification obtained increases”. In our country, however, employment opportunities remain lower than the European average even for those who achieve a tertiary qualification: the average employment rate in the EU27 (87.6%) is higher than that of Italy by 3.3 percentage points, a difference only slightly lower than that observed for medium-low securities.
The burden of parental education
The survey reveals that when parents have a low level of education, almost a quarter of young people (24%) drop out of school early and just over 10% reach a tertiary qualification. If at least one parent has a degree, on the contrary, shares become 2% and approximately 70% respectively.
The gap with the European Union
The number of young graduates in Italy is growing but the gap with the EU average remains wide. In Italy between 25 and 34 years old the percentage of graduates went from 29.2% in 2022 to 30.6% in 2023 while in the same period on average in the EU the rate of young people with a tertiary qualification went from 42% to 43.1%.
The differential in the employment rate of people aged between 25 and 64 with a tertiary qualification compared to a secondary one in Italy went from 11.1 to 11 points while in the EU it went from 9.9% to 9.8%. The rate of NEETs (young people between 15 and 29 years old not in training or at work) has decreased and in Italy in 2023 it was 16.1% (it was 19% in 2022 and 23.1% in 2021) compared to 11.2% in the EU.
NEETs, the group between 15 and 29 years old
They drop consistently Neet, young people between 15 and 29 years old who are no longer in a school/training program and are not engaged in a working activity, also thanks to the growth in employment: in Italy the share of NEETs out of the total of 15-29 year olds, reports Istat, is estimated at 16.1% for 2023 with a drop of 2.9 percentage points compared to 2022 and of 7 points on 2021.
The percentage also drops compared to 2007 (18.8%), the year before the economic crisis. The highest level was reached in 2014 (26.2%) with over 10 points more than the current share.
In the EU, the Italian value is however only lower than that of Romania (19.3%) and decidedly higher than the European average (11.2%), the Spanish and French ones (12.3%, both) and the German one (8.8%).
The gap with Europe is greatest for graduates (6.5 percentage points), decreasing to 4.7 points. for tertiary qualifications and 2 points for those with at most a lower secondary qualification. The general decline in NEETs in 2023 was in fact more marked due to the low qualifications.
The incidence of NEET, in the age group between 15 and 19, is very low (6.3%) due to the high participation in educational courses (89.7% is information).
The incidence instead rises to 19.0% in the 20-24 age group and to 22.7% among 25-29 year olds, among whom participation in the education system decreases and participation in the labor market increases (more markedly among those 25 -29 year olds).
Gender differences by citizenship are evident
The share of NEETs among foreign women (35.8%) is almost 20 percentage points higher than that among Italians (16.0%), a difference which is reduced to just 1.4 percentage points among men (15, 7% and 14.3% NEET shares among foreigners and Italians).
The employment rate among female graduates is 19.0 percentage points higher than that of female graduates, compared to only 4.3 points among men. Even the differences with the European average are significantly reduced as the level of education increases: among women with low educational qualifications the employment rate is 10.2 percentage points lower than the EU 27 average (36.8% versus 47 .0%), a difference that drops to 9.2 points for middle schoolers (62.4% versus 71.6%) and to 3.8 points among those with a tertiary qualification (81.4% versus 85.2%).
