When it comes to youth employment, the UK has a growing problem.
The number of people aged 16 to 24 who are not in education, employment or training (Neets) has reached nearly one million, or 13.5 per cent of all 16-to-24-year-olds. The unemployment rate for young people from February to April was 16.2 per cent, up from 14.3 per cent the year before.
And the number of Neets could rise even further, to 1.25 million within five years, without urgent action, according to a recent report.
Yet elsewhere in Europe, the picture looks very different.
In Switzerland, the youth unemployment rate sits at a mere 2.7 per cent, according to figures from the country’s State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) from May, while its Neet rate is between 6.9 per cent and 8.9 per cent depending on the age bracket measured.
Switzerland has enjoyed high spots in the tables for youth employment throughout Europe for some time. In 2023, Switzerland boasted a 61.5 per cent youth employment rate compared with the average of 35.2 per cent from the 27 countries that make up the European Union – of which Switzerland is not a member – according to the EU’s European Employment Services website.
For employment overall, Switzerland’s rate was 80.7 per cent, 10.3 percentage points higher than the EU27 average.
So when it comes to stopping young people being left on the scrapheap and getting them into work, education or training, what can Britain and the rest of Europe learn from Switzerland?
Watchmaking is among skills on offer for young Swiss people to learn, alongside areas like engineering, business and IT (Photo: Universal Archive/Getty)How the Swiss system works
One major reason for Switzerland’s success in driving down youth unemployment is its apprenticeship-style VET (Vocational Education and Training) model.
This “dual-system” that follows compulsory schooling sees young people combine the hands-on experience and training of an apprenticeship with vocational education in a classroom.
From around the age of 15, apprentices spend three to four days a week as apprentices at a company, with theoretical knowledge taught at vocational school one to two days a week.
The programme has a close connection with the existing job market, and is designed around what that market needs. Occupations vary from engineering and business to retail, IT, watchmaking and health and social care, and last between two and four years depending on the area chosen.
Gretener (centre) teaching during an internship at a woodworking school, as part of engineering studies he undertook after his VET apprenticeshipAfter passing, young people receive a qualification that is recognised throughout the country. Then they can continue their career, go on to higher education and specialised universities, or change path entirely.
Around two-thirds of Swiss youth pursue this programme, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, while a third of school graduates pursue academic education in baccalaureate or specialised further schooling.
Lukas Gretener, 29, who lives in Bern, Switzerland, took part in the programme when he was in his teens. He learnt carpentry on his course.
“You’re immersed completely in work, right from day one on, and you have school at the same time, so it’s the perfect combination,” he told The i Paper.
Gretener was born in Switzerland but moved to France when he was six months old. He stayed in France until he was 18, and then moved back to Switzerland specifically to join a dual-system training programme.
The French system was too theoretical and elitist, he said. “It’s all about the grades and how good you are in school; it’s like that in a lot of places, and in Switzerland it’s a bit different, because of the dual system.”
After undertaking his dual-training apprenticeship, he went on to study engineering.
Gretener said the system in France, where he grew up, was too ‘theoretical and elitist’Why the Swiss model is so successful
“The Swiss VET model is more effective at providing young people with the skills they need to get on in life than the UK’s over-emphasis on university degrees,” according to Iain Mansfield, head of education at the conservative UK think-tank Policy Exchange.
He pointed out that in Britain, one in seven young Neets had degrees, and a third of graduates were not in graduate jobs. The UK should follow the Swiss model, he said, so we had “fewer full-time bachelor’s degrees and more investment in apprenticeships, further education and workplace learning”.
Joe Dromey, the general secretary of the Fabian Society, a left-leaning UK think-tank, said there was “much we can learn from Switzerland”.
He added: “Their system has strong employer engagement, with businesses both shaping courses and qualifications, and providing meaningful work placements. Young people get a good balance between on-the-job training and classroom-based learning. And – crucially – apprenticeships are seen as a respected path to a good job.”
However, it is not just hands-on experience that makes the Swiss model so effective.
Rebecca Montacute, a research director at the Social Market Foundation, a London-based cross-party think-tank, said that in the UK, apprenticeships “tend to be a really narrow skillset”.
She told The i Paper: “We might have something like a dual-fuel smart meter installer as an apprenticeship. That’s something mega specific that’s only going to be for that specific thing a company want someone to do, rather than something much broader that might cover an entire occupation.
“Switzerland is much better at doing those much broader kinds of apprenticeships that can actually set someone up for the rest of their career, rather than being a much more short-lived one.”
She added: “In Switzerland, a normal apprenticeship is 36 months. In the UK, we’re moving in the opposite direction of that. We now have some that are less than 12 months in length. Is it just something really quick for a company to be able to get a skill that they need right now, or is it about training a young person to be able to carry on through the rest of their career?”
Gretener echoed the sentiment and said: “In the actual job market, there’s also value to train people from a young age, and then if they stay at your company, it’s just a win-win for everyone.”
The limits of the lessons for Britain
British graduates’ growing difficulties finding jobs is leading more young people to question the value of an expensive university education in the UK.
According to a British Social Attitudes survey carried out by the National Centre for Social Research, 34 per cent of respondents in 2025 believed a university education was not worth the time and money, up from 18 per cent in 2018.
However, Montacute said that adopting the Swiss VET model in the UK would not be the fix-all that it might seem.
“We shouldn’t over-index as to what we can take from countries like Switzerland because their economies are quite different to ours,” she said. “We can’t just transpose the entire Swiss system here, but we certainly could take learnings from it.”
Furthermore, Rose Stephenson, director of policy and strategy at the Higher Education Policy Institute, pointed out that there were still plenty of advantages to a university education and that most graduates see their university experience as worthwhile.
“I don’t think the negative conversation around higher education is discouraging young people from pursuing it and driving up Neet figures directly,” she added. “What might be more likely is that students are much more likely to be in part-time work alongside their studies.”
She suggested that this could be driving down some of the entry-level job opportunities for people who were not at university.
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