Overview

• ENOE figures show 67% of workers under 24 hold informal jobs without stable contracts or social protections.
• Among 20- to 29-year-olds, 31% lack employer-provided benefits, 42% earn at or below the minimum wage and nearly 25% exceed the 48-hour weekly limit.
• A study by ManpowerGroup and Junior Achievement Américas finds 60% of young jobseekers cite lack of experience as their top barrier to first employment, followed by schedule conflicts (47%) and age requirements (34%).
• Mental-health reports indicate 90% of adolescents experience anxiety, one in four face depression and public spending on mental-health services remains at just 1.3–1.6% of the health budget.
• Policy advocates are calling for expanded technical and socioemotional training, a strengthened care system and reforms to the Jóvenes Construyendo el Futuro program to tackle youth precarity.