The youth labour market and changing patterns of participation
Despite major changes in the youth labour market since the mid-1970s, notably a rapid decline in
full-time jobs for school-leavers, high levels of economic activity among 16-19 year olds remain
a distinctive characteristic of the English labour market (Employment Department 1995).
Moreover, after several years of rapidly declining entry to the youth labour market by 16 year
olds in the late 1980s and early 1990s, there has recently been a slight rise in the numbers of 16
year olds moving directly from school into full-time jobs (DfEE 1999c).
More potentially far-reaching changes, however, have been taking place within the casualised and
part-time youth labour market. The Government’s Labour Force Survey indicates a steady
increase in economic activity among 16 and 17 year olds in full-time education. The official
figure of those working rose from 25 to 31 per cent between 1992 and 1997 (DfEE 1998). Recent
local research, however, suggests that the proportion of 17 and 18 year olds in full-time education
but also working part-time could, in fact, be as high as 75 to 80 per cent (FEDA 1999, Hodgson
& Spours 2000a). Many young people involved in full-time education are also working long
hours and have patterns of work potentially disruptive to their studies. Current research suggests
that working more than 10 hours part-time may adversely affect the achievement of A Level
grades (Howard 1998, ALIS 1999). Local studies suggest that upward of 30 per cent of the A
Level and Advanced GNVQ population who are working may be in this position (FEDA 1999,
Hodgson & Spours 2000a). A Level or GNVQ grades are a determinant of whether a young
person wishes or is able to enter higher education and high hours of part-time work may therefore
be deterring a section of young people from actively considering the higher education option.
These trends suggest that there may be a relationship between a youth labour market which is no
longer declining and is changing internally and the plateauing of the participation rate in full-time
education at 16, 17 and 18. We would speculate that within a plateauing context, relatively small
movements in labour market trends can have an important effect on the ‘culture of participation’.
By this, we refer to the way that young people and their parents make decisions about
participation in education and training. We suggest later that these kinds of marginal labour
market trends, together with issues such as fees in higher education, might disproportionately
affect the ‘fragile’ or ‘wavering’ stayers-on who come from family backgrounds where it has not
been the tradition to continue in full-time education after the age of 16.
The relationship between the labour market and participation in education and training is a
complex and evolving one. Our research in South Gloucestershire on patterns of part-time work
among 16-19 year olds in full-time education, for example, indicates that many young people are
prepared to remain in education post-16 (and more so higher education) so long as they are also
able to work part-time to earn money (Hodgson & Spours 2000a). It could be argued, therefore,
that the labour market’s ability to absorb large amounts of part-time (rather than full-time) 16-19
year old workers is actually helping to sustain participation rates in full-time education.
However, there may well be a trade-off in terms of the quality of participation, with high numbers
of hours of part-time employment having an adverse affect on achievement rates in advanced
level qualifications. In addition, the fact that young people become used to earning quite
substantial sums during their period of initial post-compulsory education may be making them
and their families more reluctant to make the financial sacrifices required to enter higher
education. The policy implications of this trend will be discussed further later in this paper.