Young people's interest in youth employment policy is growing in the wake of chronic high youth unemployment. The current unemployment rate for young people records the highest since the foreign exchange crisis in 1998.

The Ministry of Employment and Labor and the Korea Employment Information Service on December 7 released the 2016 survey result regarding the young people's recognition level on the government employment policy. Among 1,600 respondents who are college students and young people aged between 18 to 34, 71% replied that they are interested in the youth employment policy. The recognition level on the government youth employment policy showed a sharp rise to 48.3%, up from 27.3% in the second half of last year.

The youth unemployment rate gets worse amid the economic slowdown. According to the Statistics Korea, the number of unemployed youth aged between 15 to 29 as of October this year reached to 371,000. The government invested 2.1 trillion won(US$ 1.8 billion) in the youth employment projects such as 'job stepping stones' and 'work and study' this year.

Youth respondents also requested more practical measures of the expansion of youth employment policy(86.6%), job success package programs(89.9%), job consulting and counselling(89.8%), employment subsidy(90.8%), job prospect guidance service(88.9%) and in-house job service at the colleges(88.4%).

reported by Lee Eun-young
translated by Kim Sung-jin

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