This represents huge social and economic waste because unemployed youth are:

Wasting the considerable educational investment that has already been made in them. In New Zealand it is an especially worthwhile investment that has been made. Results from the OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA 2000) confirm beyond doubt that New Zealand students consistently achieve in the top quartile of OECD students for Maths, Science and Reading, albeit with a diversity of achievement between and within schools. We have cause to be proud of the education of our young people. We must match it with meaningful opportunities for them to take advantage of their education.

Not contributing to society through taxation. Young unemployed do not pay PAYE. When they turn 18 that loss is compounded by the payment of the unemployment benefit. A single unemployed beneficiary will receive at least $131.13 per week. An 18-year-old in full-time employment being paid at the minimum wage would be paying around $75.00/wk in PAYE. A conservative estimate of the net effect of getting New Zealand Youth off the dole and into work is a benefit to the country of $400 million.

	Not spending and consuming as strongly as those in employment. In addition to lost PAYE through the dole there is lost GST and depressed economic growth. Young people with less disposable income are not consuming the economy’s goods and services to the extent that is healthy for them, and for the economy.

	Not saving. Not building up the financial reserves that will give them choices in their future.

Not participating in society and contributing as citizens in a meaningful way. American research shows that unemployment leads to unhealthy disconnectedness from society and the community. That is, ‘unhealthy’ in a very literal sense. Unemployed young people are far more likely to suffer from poor mental and physical health than their employed contemporaries. They are more likely to be part of a dysfunctional family situation and are far less likely to contribute at all to their community.

	Far more likely to become criminals. At one of the school focus group sessions held during research for this guide there was a young man who was clearly tightly connected to a situation of multi-generational unemployment.He spoke without inhibition about methods of augmenting benefit income by fencing stolen property in his community. Crime and unemployment are often natural bedfellows.

Recent groundbreaking research from Great Britain refers to the long-term cost to society of youth unemployment. The report Estimating the Cost of Being “Not in Education, Employment or Training” at Age 16-18 (NEET), published in September 2002, estimates the cost to Great Britain of 10,000 NEET youths over their lifetime to be nearly £1 billion. There is no reason to believe that the cost to New Zealand of NEET youth would be any less, proportionately.

At the level of the individual business a range of additional matters come to play which point to gains that can be made by businesses when they develop a strategic focus on youth employment:

	Young people are the drivers of new ideas in society; they always have been. Visionary leaders in any field usually accomplish the great discoveries, innovations, and new applications before they reach the age of 25. The world, and the role of knowledge in the world, is changing quickly. Young employees are every business’s window into a prosperous future.

	A balanced workforce is a productive and effective workforce. Businesses that allow themselves to age at the same rate as their employees lose balance in their workforce, and can often pay a hefty price later for regaining that balance. Ensuring that there is steady recruitment of young people into a business is a guarantee of long-term viability.

	Older employees rejuvenate and stretch their performance in the company of young employees. One of the most consistent pieces of feedback from the Gateway Programme (page 28) is about the positive effect of having enthusiastic secondary school students in the workplace. Their presence has been found to boost the morale and productivity of the existing workforce.

	Successful businesses operate in-step with the communities where they do business. There are no communities where youth is unimportant. Businesses with a demonstrable connection to youth in their communities have an edge on their competitors in winning in the future.

Young people are tomorrow’s market. (And, for many of the high-value products and services of the twenty-first century, today’s market). The youth market is changing as society changes. By the middle of this century half the young people in this country will be Māori or Pacifica (source: Statistics New Zealand). Is there a business that exists that can afford to be disconnected from such a huge slice of the future market?

Investing in the employment of young people is an investment with the longest possible return for an employer. Inevitably many young employees will move on to other employers, even other careers, long before they have clocked up a gold watch with a particular employer. There is no harm in that; it is a good thing. The younger the age at which an employer begins investing in the training and development of an employee, the longer the window of benefit, both for that employer in particular, and the economy in general.

Young workers are energetic and hungry. They want to get on; they want to forge careers. Recent evidence gathered about the shortage of some crucial skills to the economy, often understates the case. The fact that there are more fitters retiring than being trained is easily identified. That the fitters retiring are generally putting in far fewer hours than their younger workmates are willing to work, is far less obvious. Young workers are keen to do overtime, and can maintain a high level of productivity over extended hours.

It is not a question of whether your business can afford to tackle youth employment, rather, can you afford not to?

Are we content to see large numbers of our young people excluded and wasted? Should we allow so much talent to go to waste in our ‘land of opportunity’?

If, like us, you believe that our country should be a place of opportunity for all, then please join our journey to achieve ‘zero waste’ of New Zealanders.