Unemployment,Apprenticeships and Training: does it pay to stay on at school?

Data from the National Child Development Study are used to compare the progress up to age 23 of young people who reached 16 in March 1974 and who left full time education at 16, 17 or 18. Later leavers had higher unemployment rates on first entering the labour market because of rising national unemployment, but in the long term had a clear advantage. More significantly, those who left at 17 or 18 with qualifications no better than those of minimum age leavers suffered no long term disadvantage in comparison with the latter, despite their loss of potential work experience, and some groups had lower unemployment rates in the long term than minimum age leavers with equally good qualifications. Apprenticeships were more common among later leavers than expected, and later leavers compared favourably with early leavers in terms of other forms of in‐work training. It is concluded that the ‘non‐academic sixth’ could have a useful role alongside YTS.