Youth, Jobs, and the Future : Problems and Prospects

Youth, Jobs and the Future: Problems and Prospects features original essays by well-known sociologists, economists, educators, and labor leaders that investigate the multiple structural and cultural dimensions of youth unemployment and worsening socio-economic precarity. The volume offers a variety of analyses and suggestions for redressing the problem going forward including better school-to-work transitions, shorter hours, shared work, full employment, and basic income.

While overall unemployment has declined, the unemployment rate remains nearly twice as high for young people 16 to 19 years of age and nearly three times as high for those aged 20 to 24. Rates of unemployment and underemployment are nearly two to three times higher for Black and Latino youth. In Youth, Jobs, and the Future, Lynn S. Chancer, Martín Sánchez-Jankowski, and Christine Trost have gathered a cast of well-known interdisciplinary scholars to confront the persistent issues of youth unemployment and worsening socio-economic precarity in the United States. The book explores structural and cultural causes of youth unemployment, their ramifications for both native and immigrant youth, and how middle- and working-class youth across diverse races and ethnicities are affected within and outside the legal economy. A needed contribution, this book locates solutions to youth unemployment in economic and political changes as well as changes in cultural attitudes.