Word: youthe
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...hardships of the Franco dictatorship receded, new generations born under democracy embraced rising expectations, both material (by 2007, 81% of families owned their own home and 21% had a second one) and professional. "That was the major social change of the transition," says Cristina Bermejo, director of youth issues for the Workers' Commission, Spain's largest union. "Illiteracy had been a big problem in Spain since the civil war. But in the '70s and '80s, there was a reaction against it. Suddenly everyone, even factory workers, expected their kids to go to university and do better than they...
...that in country after country people have coined shorthand terms to describe a generation frustrated by its plight. In France that term is jeunes diplômés. In Greece, Generation 600. And in Spain its members are called mileuristas. "The mileurista," explains Daniel Lostao, president of the Youth Council of Spain, "is someone who earns €1,000 ($1,300) a month, despite all their education and training. They've got master's degrees and speak multiple languages, but they can only get a low-end job, where they're lucky to earn €1,000 a month...
...Spain lost 620,000 positions in 2008; 124,000 joined the ranks of the unemployed in March alone - but those that remain are earning even less. "People here wish they were mileuristas," says Iolanda Velasco, a Vigo city councilwoman. "They're 800-euroists." Velasco, who oversees the city's youth programs notes another change. "The cutoff age for our workshops and training sessions was 30. But because the age [people leave home] keeps rising, we just changed...
Young, Educated, Frustrated Some young Europeans are growing tired of waiting. Last year, a police shooting of a 15-year-old boy in Athens triggered weeks of riots by Greek youth. Some commentators attributed the eruption to anarchist groups, but, as elsewhere in Europe, structural flaws are just as much to blame. "In Greece, all flexibility in the labor market comes from young workers and the evolution of their wages is completely flat, while it continues to rise for people in their 40s or 50s," explains Philippe Askenazy, researcher at the Paris School of Economics. "The Greek problem stemmed from...
...While youth unemployment across the E.U. is significantly higher (17% for those 25 and under) than in the general population (7.6%), some countries are more vulnerable than others. German companies tend to hire workers at an early age; French and Spanish firms prefer temporary contracts to get around sometimes draconian labor laws. "The social crisis is more pronounced [in France and Spain] because their citizens believe policy should create more employment. But in a downturn, it leads to a rapid increase in just the opposite," says Askenazy...