Youth Unemployment and the Youth Guarantee in Ireland
Ireland has significantly reduced youth unemployment since the financial crisis, but the number of young people in employment has never fully recovered, according to the report, Youth Unemployment and the Youth Guarantee in Ireland.
Commissioned by the National Youth Council of Ireland (NYCI) and produced by TASC, the report finds that youth unemployment has been more than two and a half times the rate among workers aged 25 and over since 2017. This suggests that, although headline youth unemployment has fallen, the relative position of young people in the labour market has worsened.
Between 2000 and 2008, around 400,000 people aged 15 to 24 were in employment. That number fell by more than half between 2008 and 2012. It gradually recovered in the years that followed, but after reaching 320,600 in the third quarter of 2021, progress appears to have stalled.
The report identifies a sharp and lasting fall in labour market participation among 15 to 24-year-olds as an important part of this apparent contradiction. Fewer young people are participating in the labour market than before the financial crisis, even as participation among older workers has continued to rise.
Bringing together data from a range of sources, the report paints a stark outlook for young people in Ireland currently, according to the NYCI. Taken together the data collected and analysed shows that:
- Youth employment remains well below pre-crisis levels, despite the recovery in the population aged 15 to 24
- Labour market participation among 15 to 24-year-olds fell sharply during the financial crisis and has never recovered
- The proportion of workers under 20 receiving sub-minimum wage rates increased from around 15% historically to 30% in the first half of 2025
- The proportion of working young people living with their parents increased from 27% to 40% between 2017 and 2022
- In 2023, 33% of young people in Ireland reported feeling socially excluded, the highest rate in the EU
- Some 61% of young people said they were planning or wished to move to another country within three years
- Emigration by Irish citizens increased from around 13,000 annually before the financial crisis to 35,000 in 2025
Report author Oisín Gilmore, Senior Economist at TASC, said: "Ireland has made a strong recovery from the youth unemployment crisis of the early 2010s, but it has not solved the wider problem of labour market insecurity for young people."
