NEET Data May 2022

Laura-Jane Rawlings | Reading time: 2 minutes

Today the Office for National Statistics released the quarterly data set on young people not in education, employment or training (NEET).

Background To The Data

This data covers the quarter January to March 2022.

This dataset includes those who are in any form of part-time education or training and so the number of young people who are NEET is slightly lower than estimates from the monthly ONS Labour Market Overview which only includes those in full-time education or training.

Unemployment means a person is looking for work and is able to start work. Economically inactive means a person is not looking for work and is unable to start work.

The Headlines

  • 704,000 young people are NEET, an increase of 13,000 compared with the previous quarter October – December.
  • The changes are driven by an increase of young people who are economically inactive, which has risen by 25,000 on the last quarter which was from October to December.
  • The percentage of all young people who are NEET is estimated at 10.4%, which is up by 0.2%  but down by 0.7% compared to pre-pandemic figures (Oct-Dec 2019).
  • There were 247,000 unemployed young people who were NEET.
  • There were 457,000 economically inactive young people who were NEET and this was up by 25,000 on the previous quarter.

Graph 1 – The percentage of young people who were NEET between Match 2013 – March 2022

NEET Data By Age

55,000 young people aged 16-17 year are NEET:

  • 19,000 are unemployed,
    37,000 are economically inactive,
  • 16-17 year olds account for 3.8% of the total number of NEETs,

649,000 young people aged 18-24 year are NEET:

  • 229,000 are unemployed,
  • 420,000 are economically inactive,
  • 12.2% of all 18-24 year olds are NEET. This is up 0.2% on the last quarter.

NEET Data By Sex

387,000 of all 16-24 year old men, are NEET:

  • 169,000 are unemployed,
  • 218,000 are economically inactive,
  • 5.3% of all 16-17 year old males are NEET,
  • 12.8% of all 18-24 year old males are NEET.

317,000 of all 16-24 year old women, are NEET:

  • 78,000 are unemployed,
  • 239,000 are economically inactive,
  • 2.2% of all 16-17 year old females are NEET,
  • 11.5% of all 18-24 year olds females are NEET.

For more information, please email info@youthemployment.org.uk or call 01536 513388.

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