Foreword
As highlighted in the OECD Action Plan for Youth, successful engagement of young people in the labour market is crucial not only for their own personal economic prospects and well-being, but also for overall economic growth and social cohesion. Therefore, investing in youth is a policy priority in all countries, including Finland, requiring concerted action to develop education systems and labour market arrangements that work well together.
Following the launch of the OECD Action Plan for Youth in May 2013, the OECD is working closely with countries to implement the plan’s comprehensive measures in their national and local contexts and to provide peer-learning opportunities for countries to share their experience of policy measures to improve youth employment outcomes. This work builds on the extensive country reviews that the OECD has carried out previously on the youth labour market and vocational education and training (Jobs for Youth, Learning for Jobs and Skills beyond School), as well as on the OECD Skills Strategy.
The present report on Finland is the tenth of the series “Investing in Youth”, which builds on the expertise of the OECD on youth employment, social support and skills. This series covers OECD countries and key emerging economies. The report presents new results from a comprehensive analysis of the situation of young people in Finland, exploiting various sources of survey-based and administrative data. It provides a detailed assessment of education, employment and social policies in Finland from an international perspective, and offers tailored recommendations to help improve the school-to-work transition. Additional information related to this review can be found on the OECD website (http://oe.cd/youth-finland).
This review is joint work by the Social Policy Division and Skills and Employability Division of the Directorate for Employment, Labour and Social Affairs (ELS). Sarah Kups, Christopher Prinz and Marie-Anne Valfort prepared the report, under the supervision of Veerle Miranda (project leader) and Monika Queisser (Head of the Social Policy Division). Pauliina Patana contributed to the review as consultant and Fatima Perez provided editorial support. The report benefited from useful comments provided by Stefano Scarpetta (Director for Employment, Labour and Social Affairs).