Thinking of Luxembourg you might just imagine a wealthy country with beautiful rich people and no problems with (youth) unemployment. But regarding the statistics you’ll easily see that the nice and happy image that our governement is always presenting during European meetings is nothing but a facade. Under that surface 30% of people under 30 years are jobless (!).
Déi Jonk Gréng have been talking and proposing alternatives and criticizing this development for years. But the atmosphere is getting even worse. The Governement, in their “anti crisis and public saving programme” (grand coalition conservatives & socialists) has introduced new laws that cut social benefits for foreign commuters and young people who want to go to university. On the other hand tough, Luxembourg sponsors massively the nuclear fission programm ITER or just signed a multi-million euro contract for new military technology such as anti-tank weapons, planes and tanks (!). This nevertheless shows that cutting social benefits for youngsters and thus making their access to the labor market worse, is not a necessity but a political choice. The money is there but used for different purposes, this is called “political priorities”. Strangely the cutting of social benefits for youngsters is not the first step that the governement has taken against young people: A few months ago a law was passed that allows employers to engage people under 26 without giving them the legal minimum wage. As minimum wages are fixed by the governement this is another example of social dumping imposed to young people in Luxembourg. The Young Greens have proposed alternatives stretching from a reform in the education system that prepares teenagers who leave school in a better way for the labor market. There is a lot to do in Luxembourg, every helping hand is welcome, we plan to do our part.