More Than a Million Older Teens Aren’t Working or In School

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In Amer­i­ca, 1.3 mil­lion youth ages 16 to 19 were dis­con­nect­ed from both work and school in 2014. This fig­ure rep­re­sents a dis­con­nec­tion rate of 7% — and marks the statistic’s return to pre-reces­sion levels. 

Teens who leave school and do not enter the work­force are more like­ly to face a rougher road en route to adult­hood, accord­ing to research. 

At the state lev­el, this dis­con­nec­tion rate varies. 11% of old­er teens in Alas­ka and Louisiana are dis­con­nect­ed from work and school where­as just 4% of old­er teens in Min­neso­ta and Wyoming are both unem­ployed and absent from the classroom. 

Explore more employ­ment and edu­ca­tion data — at the state and nation­al lev­el — in the KIDS COUNT Data Center.

• Teens ages 16 to 19 not attend­ing school and not working
• Unem­ployed teens age 16 to 19
• Teens ages 16 to 19 not in school and not high school graduates