Abstract
High rates of youth unemployment across the world have captured the attention of many world organizations and other policy makers. One policy solution that has been proposed to curb these high rates is encouraging youth entrepreneurship. In this paper, we examine the formation of attitudes that are favorable to entrepreneurship using data from 185 business students in South India. We adopt an approach that tests the relative efficacy of two principal factors in the formation of entrepreneurial attitude, i.e., stocks of youth human/social capital and a series of personality traits. Results from a probit model suggest that the youth’s prior labor market experience, the social capital that youth have accumulated through volunteering, and the social connections that parents have made are all highly predictive of pro-entrepreneurial attitudes; personality traits exert less importance. Implications for these findings are discussed for the creation of strategies that can stimulate entrepreneurship among youth as one way to combat high rates of youth unemployment.
Highlights
High rates of youth unemployment across the world have captured the attention of many world organizations and other policy makers
High unemployment rates in this age group have resulted in lower youth employment-to-population ratio, which is projected to become even lower in almost all regions of the world by 2018, with the largest decrease of 1.1 to 2.5 percentage points expected to occur in the Asian regions (ILO, 2013)
Given the obvious implications of large proportions of unemployed youth for the production of human and economic capital, as well as for increased potential for youthdriven societal unrest, it is not surprising that many international bodies such as the World Bank, the United Nations, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and the International Labor Organization have been actively involved in seeking solutions to the youth unemployment crisis
Summary
High rates of youth unemployment across the world have captured the attention of many world organizations and other policy makers. The youth unemployment phenomenon has officially reached crisis proportions, so much so that it has merited a new acronym called NEET (Not in Education, Employment or Training; Eurofound, 2011) and a variant called NLFET (Neither in the Labor Force nor in Education or Training), with a large majority of unemployed youth falling into these categories Another reason for raising the alarm regarding high levels of youth unemployment when it comes to India, Schmid points out again, is that the percentage of NEET youth in India is one of the highest (28%) among the G20 countries (Schmid, 2015). The ILO’s Youth Policy Database indicates that 122 out of 198 countries had some version of a national youth policy in 2014, up from 99 countries that had some in the previous year (ILO, 2015)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
