Youth: 56% work in jobs matching their field of education

In 2024, 56.4% of young people aged 15–34 in the EU with a medium or high level of education said there was a high or very high match between their field of study and their current or last main job, European Comission reported.

The data show that 46.1% of those with a medium level of education reported a strong match, compared with 68.1% of those with a high level of education.

This indicator is based on self-assessment and measures how closely a person’s field of education corresponds to the requirements of their job, using categories ranging from “very high” to “no match.”

The strongest alignment was recorded in health and welfare, where 80.6% of highly educated graduates worked in positions closely related to their studies. Information and communication technologies (77.0%) and education (73.6%) also showed high levels of job–education match.

By contrast, 52.2% of highly educated graduates in arts and humanities reported difficulties in finding relevant employment. Similar challenges were observed among graduates in social sciences, journalism and information (59.1%), as well as services (59.3%).

At the national level, Latvia (76.5%), Lithuania (76.1%) and Germany (75.2%) recorded the highest shares of young people reporting a strong match between their education and job. Meanwhile, Italy (41.6%), Slovakia (46.2%) and Denmark (47.1%) showed the lowest levels of alignment.