Turkey's NEET rate drops as youth labor force participation increases

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Young people aged between 15-14 made up 15.3 percent of Turkey's population in 2021, according to the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat).

The number of people in this age group was 12.97 million while the country's population was 84.68 million by the end of the last year, showed the TurkStat's Youth Statistics based on the Address Based Population Registration System (ABPRS).

Men constituted 51.3 percent of the youth population and the share of women was 48.7 percent.

The proportion of the youth is expected to decrease to 14.3 percent in 2025, 14.0 percent in 2030, 13.4 percent in 2040, 11.8 percent in 2060 and 11.1 percent in 2080.

Comparison to EU countries

Turkey's youth population of 15.3 percent was higher than that of 27 European Union (EU) member countries. The EU average of the proportion of the youth population was 10.6 percent in 2021.

Youngest cities

According to ABPRS results, the province with the highest proportion of youth population was the eastern province of Hakkari with 22.8 percent in 2021. It was followed by the southeastern provinces of Şırnak with 22.1 percent and Siirt with 21.8 percent.

The provinces with the lowest proportions of youth population were Muğla with 12.3 percent. It was followed by Tunceli and Balıkesir with 12.7 percent.

Marriage more common among women

Marriage was much more common among young women than young men. Some 96.2 percent of the young men and 84.9 percent of the young women never married, while 14.7 percent of the young women were married and 0.4 of them were divorced.

Higher education

Turkey's net enrollment rate in higher education in 2019-2020 was 43.4 percent. It rose to 44.4 percent in the 2020-2011 school year.

For men, it decreased from 40.6 percent to 40.5 percent, and for women, it increased from 46.3 percent to 48.5 percent.

NEET rate drops

According to TurkStat's household labor force survey, the labor force participation rate for young people was 39.1 percent in 2020 and 41.7 percent in 2021.

While the labor force participation rate for young men was 50.1 percent in 2020, it was 53.1 percent in 2021. It was 27.5 percent in 2020 and 29.7 percent in 2021.

The unemployment rate for young people was 25.3 percent in 2020 and was 22.6 percent in 2021. The unemployment rate for young men was 22.6 percent in 2020 and 19.4 percent in 2021. This rate for young women was 30.3 percent in 2020, it was 28.7 percent in 2021.

The proportion of young people who took part in neither education nor employment was 28.3 percent in 2020, and it dropped to 24.7 percent in 2021.

The proportion of young men who took part in neither education nor employment was 21.2 percent in 2020 and 17.5 percent in 2021. This proportion for young femen was 35.7 percent in 2020 and 32.4 percent in 2021. (HA/VK)