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Young woman at work: only a few 15 to 24-year-olds can live on their own wages.
Photo: Franziska & Tom Werner / Getty Images
The majority of young people between the ages of 15 and 24 in Germany (51 percent) live at the expense of their parents or other relatives: only 38 percent of them earned most of their money last year, i.e. they received their main income from their own gainful employment.
30 years earlier, the ratio was reversed: in 1991, more than half of the 15 to 24 year olds (52 percent) lived on their own earned income.
Only 40 percent were financially dependent on their relatives.
This is reported by the Federal Statistical Office.
The reason is obvious: Most 15 to 24-year-olds are still in school, studying or training these days.
More young people rely on public services
One in ten in the age group examined received their main income from public services in 2021.
In the first Corona year 2020 it was almost every eighth young person - the highest level since reunification.
In the group of benefit recipients there are also many who were neither in school nor in vocational training nor in gainful employment.
Their share rose to 7.5 percent during the coronavirus pandemic after hitting a ten-year low of 5.7 percent in 2019.
In a European comparison, the opportunities for young people on the German labor market are above average: Only 6.9 percent of the labor force between the ages of 15 and 24 were unemployed in this country in 2021, while the figure in the EU was 16.6 percent.
However, almost a third of young employees in Germany (29.2 percent) work in an atypical contractual relationship: either temporary, part-time with less than 21 hours per week, marginally employed or in temporary work.
This proportion is significantly higher in the young age group than in other age groups.
asr/dpa