Page 17 - IDEA Study 3 2018 Low skilled

Low-skilled women are more likely to be inactive and less likely to be unemployed than low-skilled men. Low-skilled women are even less likely to be employed than men (only 35% of women work), but they are also less likely to be unemployed (9.6% of unemployed among low- skilled women compared to 14% among low-skilled men, see Table 5). The employment rate among the disabled low-skilled is only 3%, compared to between 7% and 10% among the other skill groups. Table 5. Economic Status of the Low-skilled by Gender Source: LFS data 2014-2016, own calculation. The young low-skilled, who left the education system, have a very low employment rate. Table A2 in the Appendix shows that the share of the low-skilled among the youngest cohorts has increased in recent years. One potential explanation could be the current economic situation with the low unemployment rate, which may motivate young individuals to drop out of school and enter the labor market early (rather than postpone labor market entry and risk that their entry will occur when the labor market is less tight). However, Table 6 reveals that young individuals who left the educational system without finishing upper secondary school have a very low employment rate (only 26% of low- skilled non-students aged 15-19 works). Therefore, if young individuals drop out of education with the intention to enter employment, their strategy appears to be unsuccessful. The high share of the unemployed and inactive among low-skilled early school-leavers is rather alarming given that their chances of successfully finding a job with the low level of skills and no work experience will be even lower in the future. employed unemployed inactive Low-skilled men 52.0% 14.1% 33.9% Low-skilled women 35.3% 9.6% 55.1% 15