GENEVA, Oct. 19 (Xinhua) -- Switzerland is the second best labor market for young European citizens, only behind Denmark, according to a latest survey released by the Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETHZ) on Thursday.
The survey, Youth Labor Market Index, was conducted by the Economic Institute (KOF) at ETHZ, and includes an annual ranking of over 30 countries in terms of youth employment.
The index analyzes the youth situation on the labor market using 12 indicators that are subdivided into four categories -- activity state, working conditions, education and transition smoothness.
According to the latest statistics from 2015, Denmark came out on top, followed by Switzerland, Austria, Germany and the Netherlands. Switzerland scored 5.71 on a scale of one to seven, comfortably above the EU average of 4.82.
The report said from 2010 to 2015, Switzerland saw small increases in unemployment rate, but the negative trends were accompanied by a moderate increase in education and training enrolment. Such mixed patterns suggest "some possible countercyclical effects between labor market conditions and education for Switzerland, the report says.
KOF said the job situation for Europe's youngsters was starting to show "general signs of improvement" following the financial crisis. These were "welcome signs of a slight recovery in the difficult aftermath" of the recession, it added.
Eurostat, the EU's statistics agency, said the number of jobless in August fell by 42,000 to 14.751 million. The unemployment rate held at 9.1 percent, the joint-lowest since February 2009.
In Switzerland, the unemployment rate in Switzerland in September remained unchanged at three percent. The Swiss National Bank predicts growth of just under one percent this year in Switzerland, while the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs has downgraded its growth forecast for 2017 to 0.9 percent, but expected the GDP growth to accelerate to two percent next year.
