Switzerland, Norway and Germany have however not witnessed a dramatic increase in youth unemployment in the aftermath of the

crisis. One reason for this, according to experts, is the success of the dual training system which is particularly important in
Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

In Germany, young people and young adults gain hands-on experience of their future professions in companies, while completing
the theoretical part of their training in vocational schools. Ideally, trainees should be taken on by the training company after their
apprenticeship. Where this is not possible, they can use the experience gained during their apprenticeship to apply to other
companies, thus easing their transition to working life.

Many industrialised countries have no comparable training system but only offer school-based vocational training or, alternatively,
on-the-job training. Even in the vast majority of countries where in-company vocational training and school-based vocational training
coexist, training within a firm is often viewed as less important than its school-based equivalent.

Overall, the countries with a relatively high proportion of apprentices, such as Germany, Austria, Australia, Denmark, the
Netherlands and Norway, have significantly fewer problems with youth unemployment than countries with a low supply of them,
such as Belgium, France, Spain or Italy.

Success factors
Among measures adopted by the EU in 2012 to combat high youth unemployment are transforming attitudes to vocational training
and supporting reform of training systems to improve the quality of vocational training and the supply of training places. But success
does not depend solely on the commitment of companies to practical training: a comparative country study by several German
foundations and institutes also identified