Young people in Greece, Ireland and Spain talk about how the economic crisis is affecting them
• Europe's lost generation costs €153bn a year
Athens
Glykeria Papadopoulou is young and ambitious. She dreams of becoming a teacher of modern Greek literature. In the four years since she graduated with a degree in the field, she has sent out her CV "hundreds of times", placed adverts in print and online media, and even stickers on lampposts outside schools. But youth unemployment in Greece is at 55.4%, higher than any other EU country.
"It is quite clear that my generation has lost out," she says. "The previous generation didn't think so much about the future. They grew up dreaming of having work, money, a home and family and educating their children and here we are educated and with a home but with no work or money."
She recently signed up to a six-month university course to teach children with learning disabilities, a programme her retired father underwrote to improve his daughter's prospects.
"At least I have a family who looks after me and I don't have to worry about paying house-rent or any bills," she adds. "But being supported by your parents at such an age is also bad for your self-confidence and self-esteem. And there is no way you can have dreams or make plans of having a family or your own."
More women than men account for the growing number of young people who are overeducated and underemployed in Greece. Lack of state support, inevitably, has come also to exacerbate their frustration. Papadopoulou could move abroad – the brain drain has assumed alarming proportions since the eruption of Europe's debt crisis in Athens three years ago – but she doesn't want to.
She added: "I don't want to abandon my country because this is where I have my friends, family and home and in the present climate I'm not convinced it would be easier abroad.
"If Greece is to get out of this crisis, the mentality has to change and that might need many more years, perhaps another generation, for that to happen." Helena Smith
Dublin
Ryan Greene is caught in a jobless limbo. The 20-year-old Dubliner has a minimal qualification in Ireland's version of A-levels, so is not a priority for training projects. But he hasn't enough points from his leaving certificate to get into a third-level college.
His Arsenal shirt, tracksuit bottoms and trainers point to his ambition – to become a fitness trainer or teach physical education. "I'm caught in the middle," he said at the job centre in Ballymun, north Dublin, a high-rise district ravaged by heroin addiction and the presence of armed crime gangs. "I've been unemployed for two years and I come here every single day looking for work, filling in forms, sending around CVs."
Almost 15% of the Irish workforce is out of work with only a quarter of people aged 15-24 holding down a job. Last year 50,000, mainly young Irish citizens, emigrated.
Greene says that while some of his friends have gone to work in mining in Australia he will tough it out at home. "I live with my mum and dad, and I'm lucky I've got a large caring family with loads of brothers and sisters. I couldn't imagine emigrating to somewhere so far away."
The other option that holds out the prospect of money, a car and status for many of his generation is to become a "soldier" in one of the proliferating crime gangs across Dublin. "When I was younger I hung around with a crowd who were into the gangs and I could have easily got roped in. I'm not interested in that. All I want to do is get a job, to train and help others to get fit." Henry McDonald
Alcala de Henares
Alvaro Couceiro dreams of going home to his grandparents' flat in Alcala de Henares, a town near Madrid, and dropping money on the kitchen table. "It would be a way of thanking them for keeping me going," the 19-year-old said. Couceiro left school after the equivalent of GCSEs. He did a training course to be a chef. "I really enjoyed it," he said. "That is what I want to do."
But youth unemployment in Spain is over 50%, and a quarter of all Spaniards are unemployed. And while many are heading back to school, a quarter of Spaniards aged 18-29 neither work nor study.
A temping agency gave him occasional work as a waiter, paid by the hour.
"Though I always knew when I had to start, they never said when I would finish," he said. "One day I went to a hotel at 4pm, worked until 5am and started again at 6am."
Now even temporary work has dried up as Spain's economy collapses into double-dip recession. So Couceiro lives with his grandparents, who feed him and give him a weekly allowance; Spain's welfare state is not generous. his sporadic work history means he has no right to the dole or any other state support. His family is expected to look after him.
"The training courses at the employment office are full and, anyway, they are being cut back - so I have little chance of getting on to one," he says. "I'd do anything to work. If someone called me to clean their house, I'd be there immediately."
Like many young Spaniards, he is thinking of emigrating. None of his friends work. "The lucky ones are studying, the others are like me," he said. "Some say they don't care, but they are lying. Everyone needs money." He is grateful to his grandparents.
"They pretend to have spare pension money to give me, but they only just get to the end of the month," he said. "One day I'll pay them back. For that, I need a job." Giles Tremlett
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