In 2009 a youth report was requested by the Council of the European Union and constitutes one of the supporting documents of the Commission’s communication for the new youth cooperation framework, entitled “an European Union strategy for youth: investing and empowering”
In most European countries over 80% of the population remains at school at least one year after the end of compulsory education.
Learning languages at school is a reality for most pupils in upper secondary and the exception are Portugal and United Kingdom where 40% or more pupils do not learn any foreign languages.
According to the newspaper the Observer of the 26th of June 2011 “ for many in the UK, English is their first and only language they comfort themselves with the belief that everyone speaks English when that is not true of 75% of the world’s population (…) now 60% of state schools and 3 quarters of 14 years old do not study a modern language. The new English baccalaureate requires a modern language as one of its key subjects but it’s too soon to tell whether this reverses the trend the last several years”
In Europe, young people are more exposed to low wages, precariousness and unemployment although they have a good education compared with the older generation.
The proportion of young people running they own business is very low in Europe: about 4% of young people aged 15-24 and 9% of the age group of the age group 25-29 are self-employed
According to the EU youth report “ 6 out of 10 entrepreneurs did not have any special training (…) but in Italy about half of the entrepreneurs undertook a special training on their own initiative while one fourth of French entrepreneurs did so upon a public authority’s request".
For all young the main motivation to set up a business is being their own boss.
I recommend you to read this youth report if you can. In this report you will find some information about young people on these following topics :
Work and training
Education and schools
Health and leisure time
Employment and entrepreneurship
I have met a lot of young people in UK who can only speak english. Some of them think going to University is a waste of time. Higher education and learning a foreign language are a better chance to find a job in Uk or elsewhere.