Young people, further than ever from independence

At an average rate of 21.5%, the number of young people becoming independent from their parents is falling

The crisis is still affecting one of the most vulnerable sectors of the population: young people. According to the latest study by the Emancipation Observatory of the Spanish Youth Council (CJE), young workers, under the age of 30, will have to invest all their earnings for at least 12.3 years to be able to acquire a home. With an employment rate that hardly reaches 35.5% among people aged 18 to 30, becoming independent is a struggle, resulting in almost eight out of every ten young people continue to live at home with their parents.

During recent years, there has been a decline in the number of people who choose to live independently from their parents. From 25.6% in 2010, to 22.1% in 2013 and, finally, 21.5% today, according to the latest study prepared by the CJE in the last quarter of 2014. The most worrying aspect is that the forecasts do not augur well in the future as young people choose to pursue greater specialization in their studies due to the impossibility of finding a job. Among those who still live with their parents, 64.5% of those aged 18 to 30 are unemployed, while the rest have income levels that are too low to attempt to buy or rent a house. The average age at which young people leave their parents’ homes now exceeds thirty.

The situation in the Basque Country does not differ much from the rest of Spain. There has been a slight increase in emancipation rates since the end of 2013 when compared to the same period in the following year (18.5% compared to 20.3% today). However, the Basque average is 1.2 points below the Spanish figures. The reasons: ever higher prices and the difficulty of finding jobs together with high levels of precariousness, temporary employment, underemployment and overemployment. The employment rate has improved in the Basque Country, reaching 36.2%, almost three points higher than in the rest of the country, while the unemployment rate is lower than the Spanish average: 19.1% compared to 26.6%.