"Overeducation is one of the most important mechanisms for labor market adjustment when there is an excess supply of high-skilled workers. However, there is much debate about the consequences of this phenomena and the short and long term effects for both the overeducated worker and the economy as a whole. This book contributes to our understanding of recent developments in the research on overeducation by providing a detailed overview of the pertinent theoretical and policy issues."

The recent recession has led to an ongoing crisis in the youth labour market in Europe. This timely book deals with a number of areas related to the context, choices and experiences of young people, the consequences of which resonate throughout their lives. The focus of the contributions to this volume is on issues which, whilst undoubtedly important, have thus far received less attention than they arguably deserve. The first part of the book is concerned with issues related to education and training, covering matters such as the role of monopsony in training, the consequences of over-education, and the quality of educational institutions from primary to tertiary. The second part is primarily concerned with the long-term consequences of short-term choices and experiences including contributions on health-related choices, health consequences later in life, factors affecting the home-leaving decision, as well as an analysis of the increasing intergenerational transmission of inequality; a trend which accelerated during the recession. The last part of the book deals with issues related to youth unemployment and NEET – the direct consequence of the recession. This book contains a number of innovative analyses reporting significant findings that contrast with standard models. Some of the more interesting results directly contradict conventional wisdom on a number of topics from the importance of monopsony in training markets to the importance of transitory income changes on consumption of addictive goods. This book is suitable for those who study labor economics, political economy as well as employment and unemployment.

This timely analysis examines the complex state of youth unemployment across Europe and offers cogent policy suggestions for addressing this longstanding societal problem. The findings reveal numerous national and regional factors affecting youth joblessness—not only market and economic challenges, but also deep sociocultural and political dynamics underlying the situations. Coverage details how the standard transition from school to work is disrupted in an already depressed adult job market, and compares a wide range of responses in terms of both young people’s educational decision-making and national youth policy. In particular, contributors assess whether the current crop of Youth Guarantee programs can/should be a model for employment policy across the continent. Among the topics covered: Youth labour market prospects and recent policy developments. Youth labour market in Central and Eastern Europe. Early school dropout in Spain: evolution during the Great Recession. Overeducation among European university graduates: a constraint or a choice? Promoting youth employment in Europe: evidence-based policy lessons. The evaluation of a Finnish youth guarantee: lessons for Europe? European Youth Labour Markets is of interest to an international audience of economists, sociologists, and leaders in governmental, non-profit, and corporate sectors through its broad and comparative macroeconomic focus and implications for policymaking, research, resource allocation, and policy evaluation.

This publication is the first from the Leverhulme program of study, which focused on the major strategic options likely to be available to higher education institutions and policy-making bodies in the 1980s and 1990s. It resulted from a specialist seminar on higher education and the labor market. The chapters are: "Employers' Perceptions of Demand" (Laurence C. Hunter); "Technological Manpower" (Derek L. Bosworth); "Response to Change in the United States" (Richard B. Freeman); "Higher Education Policy" (Maurice Peston); and "The Challenge of Market Imperatives" (Robert M. Lindley). Lindley notes that the British higher education system has never come to grips with the role it might play in economic development and examines some areas of need and improvement: the search for more students; the need to get the labor market more involved in the environment of higher education and to get education to respond to market need with qualified persons; the role of higher education in the screening and credentialism process; to encourage industry's role in funding and organizing higher education; and stabilizing the labor market environment. It is concluded that labor market issues have to be handled at a more sophisticated level than the debate about manpower alone. (LC)

This volume contains original research articles which analyze the linkages between education and skills and the causes and consequences of different types of skill mismatch. The volume yields new insights regarding overeducation, underskilling, graduate jobs, wages returns to skills, aggregate productivity, job complexity and skill development.

Exacerbated by the Great Recession, youth transitions to employment and adulthood have become increasingly protracted, precarious, and differentiated by gender, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. Youth Labor in Transition examines young people's integration into employment, alongside the decisions and consequences of migrating to find work and later returning home. The authors identify key policy challenges for the future related to NEETS, overeducation, self-employment, and ethnic differences in outcomes. This illustrates the need to encompass a wider understanding of youth employment and job insecurity by including an analysis of economic production and how it relates to social reproduction of labor if policy intervention is to be effective. The mapping and extensive analysis in this book are the result of a 3«-year, European Union-funded research project (Strategic Transitions for Youth Labour in Europe, or STYLE; http://www.style-research.eu) coordinated by Jacqueline O'Reilly. With an overall budget of just under 5 million euros and involving 25 research partners; an international advisory network and local advisory boards of employers, unions, and policymakers; and non-governmental organizations from more than 20 European countries, STYLE is one of the largest European Commission-funded research projects to exist on this topic. Consequently, this book will appeal to an array of audiences, including academic and policy researchers in sociology, political science, economics, management studies, and more particular labor market and social policy; policy communities; and bachelor's- and master's-level students in courses on European studies or any of the aforementioned subject areas.

The public provision of early childhood education has developed at different rates across individual countries over the past two centuries. This book provides the historical background to explain how these national differences occurred, with particular reference to welfare and educational systems, to highlight how particular influences grew.