Save the children, for teenagers social lift blocked: 67.4% think they cannot get a decent job

Poverty penalises the aspirations of adolescents. This is proven by the data of the research 'Domani (Im)possibili' (Tomorrow (Im)possible), edited by Save the Children and presented at the Acquario di Roma on the occasion of the opening of 'Impossibile 2024', the biennial exhibition on the rights of children and adolescents. The goal to aim for, the non-governmental organisation emphasises, is to make possible what is impossible today. In Italy, more than 100,000 girls and boys between the ages of 15 and 16 live in conditions of severe material deprivation. Almost one out of every ten adolescents. And there are many, 67.4%, who believe that the work of the future will not allow them to escape from poverty.

The data show that there is a dramatic gap in expectations for the future between children living in poverty and their peers growing up in families without economic problems. More than one in four children living in material deprivation say they will not finish school and go to work (compared to 8.9% of their peers). 67.4% fear that even if they work, they will not have sufficient economic resources to lift themselves out of poverty, compared to 25.9% of teenagers not living in deprivation. "Due to a serious generational injustice, it is precisely young people in Italy who are most affected by poverty. Listening to the voices of boys and girls, we found that this condition not only affects their present, but also closes their expectations for the future," said Claudio Tesauro, president of Save the Children

Regardless of economic conditions, the most discouraged are girls: they have higher expectations than their peers about their studies, but very low expectations about the future in the world of work. Despite the fact that 69.4% think they will definitely attend university (compared to 40.7% of boys), as many as 46.1% of girls are afraid of not finding a decent job (compared to 30.5% of boys) and one in three (29.4%) say they will not be able to do what they want, compared to 24.3% of boys.

Looking at their future, although almost half of the adolescents interviewed experience positive feelings, more than 40% experience negative ones such as anxiety (24.8%), distrust (5.8%) or fear (12.1%) and 10.5% do not think about the future. Most are well aware of the weight of inequalities: almost two-thirds (64.6%) think that in Italy today a girl or boy living in families with economic difficulties will have to face many more obstacles than their better-off peers, showing great awareness of a social lift that is now blocked.

The main challenges that teenagers see on the horizon are climate crisis (43.2%), artificial intelligence (37.1%), discrimination and violence (34.8%). Mistrust in the institutions' ability to implement policies to reduce inequalities prevails (59.7%). To help young people get out of deprivation, adolescents ask public institutions to intervene first of all with economic support for families in poverty (50.9%) and, in second place, with the introduction of free psychological support for all girls and boys (49.4%), confirming how the right to psychological wellbeing has become a real priority for the first time, thanks to them.