Why Are So Many Filipino Youth Unemployed?

Sharing my talk about Social Media's Role in Youth Employment at the ASEAN University Student Council Union Conference held in Singapore. The 2-day event brought together around 100 youth participants, including university student leaders from across ASEAN Member States and advisors from the ASEAN Senior Officials Meeting on Youth (SOMY).

There was this day in my college life that I will never forget.

I was in my senior year, taking up my Bachelor's in Industrial Engineering at the University of the Philippines.

It was a nice day with clear skies. Perfect for our college's annual career fair. That day, hundreds of senior students were buzzing with energy and hope- submitting resumes left and right to companies where they aspired to work at.

I remember it so clearly because I was the only one in my batch to not submit a resume to any company. Except of course for those who already had job offers.

I felt really lost that day.

The country's top engineering companies were all there, yet at the back of my mind I knew I didn't want to work in construction, energy, oil, mining or manufacturing.

There were also business consulting companies, but I knew I didn't have the grades to qualify. Rumor was they only took in the top 5%.

Yet when I asked myself what kind of company I wanted to work for, I couldn't come up with anything. 

You see I had spent all my college life focusing on finishing my degree. With all the exams, papers, and extracurricular activities, I had forgotten what the point of it all was. 

My college degree was supposed to secure my dream career. Yet there I was, just a stone's throw away from my diploma but no clue what to use the diploma for. 

That day was my first real experience with the concept of employment. And it was filled with fear, self-doubt, and anxiety. 

It was so many negative feelings. And unfortunately, when we experience such feelings, we tend to find something or someone to blame. 

I thought, how come amidst the many majors, subjects, and electives we were required to take up in college, not a single one focused on career path and employment? It must be the university's fault. 

I thought, how come the employers have to hire based mainly on grades? I knew I was highly capable but since I just never did well on written exams, my abilities have already been judged. In this case, it must be the employers' fault. 

Later in my life, I would come to learn that our broken education to employment system was nobody's fault. Rather, it had started out as a broken system that nobody has been able to fix to this day.

I would also come to learn that my employment problems that day was quite simple compared to what most of the Filipino Youth are experiencing today. 

Since I was lucky enough to go to a top school, the question wasn't "could i get a job?" 

Instead it was "what job is right for me?" It was simply a choice problem since I had gone to a good school.

But what about the 90% who don't get in to good schools?

In the Philippines, about half or 48.2% of those unemployed are from ages 18-24. This is based on Philippine Statistics Authority data. 

Let me repeat that in simpler terms. Out of the 2.36 million Filipinos who are unemployed, half or 1.18 million are youth aged 18 to 24. 

Why are so many Filipino youth unemployed?

The answer is because most youth do not have the financial means to get a college degree. And a college degree is the only ticket to employment, because 76% of our employers are only hiring college degree holders.

To top it off, having a degree doesn't fully guarantee you a job.

In our country, 22% or almost a quarter of unemployed youth are college graduates who take about a year to find work due to the lack of employability skills. This is according to Asian Development Bank.

Many drift into informal work, often part time and poorly paid, or remain unemployed. 

This is alarming, because the longer the youth are kept out of the workforce, the higher the risk of unemployment and underemployment later in life. 

Most affected by this are the poor who are banking on their education to escape poverty, which means that their degrees must lead to employment.

The problem is rooted in the Philippines’ poor education-to employment system. Colleges and universities still don’t have core employability skills training built in their curriculum. 

And here is where I want to start the conversation about Social Media's role in youth employment.

I want you all to think about the year that is about to end.

For the entire year that has passed, think about the hours that you spent scrolling through your Facebook and Twitter feeds...and the many moments you watched Instagram and Snapchat stories. How many posts talked about youth employment?

Personally, I've probably only seen as much as 3 news articles about it this year, versus maybe 200 plus articles about the same politician. 

And this is the first way we must optimize social media for youth employment- to Reduce Distractions and Increase Awareness. 

Before I started InvestEd, I was too attracted to the noise and distractions online. Eventually I learned that that was precisely the business model of social media and news. To push out headlines which will stir the strongest emotions, such as anger, fear and hate. Because the more clicks means more ads exposure. 

Afterwards, I learned to ignore the distractions and instead use social media as a platform for awareness. These days, i rarely share negative posts but focus instead on sharing inspirational and educational content, such as the things we learn at InvestEd. 

My co founders and I put up InvestEd with the objective of addressing major problems of Filipino youth. And as I had mentioned earlier, unemployment was at the top.

InvestEd seeks to advance youth employment in two ways: 

First, we offer a student loan program to help marginalized youth finish their degrees. To date we have given loans to students across 75 degree courses and 178 schools.

Second, we go beyond financing education and also offer a placement program for our students. We created this because student loans only work if good careers await the student borrower. Today, InvestEd's graduates experience an average job placement rate of 18 days. Much faster than the national average of 130 days. That's from graduation day to accepting a job offer.

This is the second role of social media in youth employment. To enable scale for youth services such as ours.

Students don't even need to go to our office to get an education loan- they just see it on their Facebook feed through our posts. Afterwards, they can apply online at our website, www.invested.ph and get approved in a few days.

Our placement services are provided through an online platform, so that we can reach more youth at a lower cost. We also advertise via social media to maximize reach.

Looking back to that day in college when I was so lost with my career. It was in 2014, just a few years ago. Back then social media was not used as a tool for employment yet. Today, we have to ask ourselves, has the usage of social media become worse or better? 

More importantly, we have to ask ourselves this: What is our role? 

So remember this- when it comes to advancing the youth through social media:

Reduce Distractions

Increase Awareness

And use it to make your solutions scale.

And as a side note, know these two things:

First, is you have to pay it forward.

You know the saying, "I stand on the shoulder of giants."? I personally would not be here if it weren't for great mentors whom i looked up to and taught me how to find my career path. Mentors, role models and teachers who taught me both hard and soft skills. I am here today because I am paying it forward.

Now it's your turn. You are all privileged to be here today and you have a duty to go back to your country and share what you have learned to your fellow youth. Always pay it forward.

Second, wherever you go, fight for equal opportunity. 

Wherever you will work, you will meet many smart, hardworking and driven people that have never been granted opportunity to advance, simply due to their race, gender or economic status. 

In that case, do everything you can to change the status quo. But also be patient about it. There is a rule of 10 we like to call in the development sector. The rule of 10 states that you need to spend at least 10 years working on a social problem to create a significant dent. 

Let's pay it forward and fight for equal opportunity.