Youth employment, unemployment and school participation

This paper identifies and examines the trends in teenage labour force and s chool participation in Australia over the past 25 years. It covers a broad range of associated issues such as school retention, youth employment, and apprenticeships. The aim here is to determine the important movements in yo ung persons' participation in post-compulsory education and the labour forc e, and the changing interaction between the two in recent decades. To this end, a model of secondary education participation is developed. The results from this work indicate that declining full-time employment and increasing income support for students have been the most important determinants of s chool participation in Australia over the last 25 years. The results of thi s paper have important implications for government policy on school partici pation.