More economically inactive youths sitting at home

SEJONG, Jan. 11 (Yonhap) -- More than 300,000 economically inactive youths stayed at home last year without seeking or preparing for jobs, data showed Thursday.

Reasons for being not economically active included being enrolled in studies, raising children, housework, physical limitations, preparing to enlist in the military or just opting to not have a job. The last group totaled 301,000 last year, 28,000 more than the previous year, according to Statistics Korea.

Last year, 3.2 percent of the economically inactive youth population stayed at home, up from 2.9 percent the previous year, the data showed.

Statistics Korea’s jobless rate data for 2017, released Wednesday, said the unemployment rate for youths, those aged 15-29, reached 9.9 percent, the highest since data collection began in 2000. Economists say the high rate of joblessness likely contributed to more young people staying on the sidelines.

"(They) probably were discouraged because they were unable to find jobs even when they tried and ended up giving up looking for employment and even abandoned efforts to prepare for jobs," Chung-Ang University professor Lee Byung-hoon said. Given the number of graduating university students and demographic changes, the problems from youth unemployment and economic inactivity will remain until 2025, he said.
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