Economic and Social Reports
Youth life satisfaction during the COVID-19 pandemic in a cross-national comparison

Life satisfaction, which refers to an individual’s subjective evaluation of their life overall (Hall, 2014), correlates with multiple dimensions of well-being (Kansky & Diener, 2017; Proctor, Linley, & Maltby, 2009). Life satisfaction differs by individual characteristics such as age, income, education and employment (Diener, Oishi, & Tay, 2018). Country-level conditions—e.g., levels of development, economic security and personal freedom—can also contribute to patterns in life satisfaction, regardless of individual characteristics (Clark et al., 2018).

One concern is whether the COVID-19 pandemic has had a more adverse impact on the life satisfaction of youth than on that of older people, and how this differed across countries. Life satisfaction generally follows a U-shaped age pattern over the life course (Blanchflower & Graham, 2021). People in their 20s and those in their 60s and 70s are, on average, more satisfied with their lives than those in midlife, although with substantial individual differences (Galambos et al., 2020). A recent study of the countries belonging to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) showed that younger people’s life satisfaction declined from 2019 to 2020, while it improved for older people (OECD, 2021). But little is known about cross-national differences in the decline of youth life satisfaction during the pandemic.

Differences in policy responses to COVID-19 are a potential source of cross-national variation in life satisfaction among youth. Across Europe, policy interventions such as restrictions on social gatherings, school closures and stay-at-home mandates had a negative impact on the mental well-being of youth (Toffolutti et al., 2022), and this suggests that country-level differences in the implementation and duration of these policies are relevant to variations in life satisfaction. In addition, while Germany and the United Kingdom provided relatively strong protection for youth employment during the pandemic, Canada and Ireland experienced higher youth unemployment rates (Deng et al., 2022). This has further implications for cross-national variation.

This report compares life satisfaction in 2018 with that in 2020 and 2021, before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. The experiences of youth in Canada are compared with those of youth in Germany, Ireland and the United Kingdom, as well as the average for the European Union (EU). Youth in these countries generally had high levels of life satisfaction before the pandemic, but its repercussions on the mental well-being and employment of youth may have eroded their life satisfaction (Deng et al., 2022; Schoon & Henseke, 2022). The experiences of youth are compared with those of older adults to assess whether the burden of the pandemic on life satisfaction was heavier for youth.

Life satisfaction before and during the COVID-19 pandemic^Note 

This study examines the changes in the proportion of youth (people aged 15 to 30 years) with low life satisfaction.^Note  Before the pandemic, there was substantial cross-national variation in the proportion of youth who had low levels of life satisfaction. Proportionally fewer youth in Canada and Ireland had low life satisfaction in 2018 compared with those in the United Kingdom, those in Germany and the average for the EU. With the onset of the pandemic in 2020, there has been a deterioration in life satisfaction among youth in most, but not all, countries, increasing cross-national differences.

About 1.4% of Canadian youth had low life satisfaction in 2018. This increased to 2.4%^{Note E: Use with caution} in 2020, the first year of the pandemic (Table 1).^Note  In 2021, the proportion of youth with low life satisfaction (2.3%) was similar to that in the previous year. Despite the increase from 2018 to 2021, the proportion of Canadian youth with low life satisfaction was low compared with the youth in other countries over the entire period. In the United Kingdom, 6.1% of youth had low life satisfaction in 2018. This tripled to 18.6% by 2021. In Ireland, 25.4% of youth had low life satisfaction in 2021, a surge from 2.7% in 2018. In contrast, the proportion of German youth with low life satisfaction in 2021 (8.7%) was similar to that in 2018 (9.0%). Across countries, there is no evidence that life satisfaction among youth had recovered from the COVID-19 shock by 2021 (Table 1).



Have age patterns in life satisfaction changed?

In 2018, the proportion of Canadians aged 15 to 30 years with low life satisfaction (1.4%) was about half that of Canadians aged 31 to 60 years (2.8%). In 2021, the difference between these age groups was far smaller and not significant. The reduction in the gap between these age groups was attributable to the large increase in the proportion of youth with low life satisfaction from 2018 to 2021, as the proportion of older Canadians with low life satisfaction was stable over this period.^Note   Across the EU, including the United Kingdom, the gap in life satisfaction between youth and older people also decreased significantly between 2018 and 2021. This development was particularly striking in Ireland, where levels of low life satisfaction among people aged 15 to 30 years exceeded those of people aged 31 to 60 years by a large margin in 2021 (Table 1).

Spotlight on youth not in employment, education or training

Among youth, those not in employment, education or training (NEET) may have been particularly vulnerable to declines in life satisfaction (Jongbloed & Giret, 2021). Chart 1 provides preliminary evidence for what has happened to the inequality in life satisfaction between youth who were NEET and non-NEET over the pandemic.

Data table for Chart 1



Data table Chart 1
Percentage point difference in low life satisfaction between youth not in employment, education or training (NEET) and non-NEET youth
Table summary
This table displays the results of Percentage point difference in low life satisfaction between youth not in employment 2018, 2021, Difference in 2018, 95% confidence interval and Difference in 2021 (appearing as column headers).

	2018			2021
	Difference in 2018	95% confidence interval		Difference in 2021	95% confidence interval
		Lower	Upper		Lower	Upper
Canada	2.7	1.3	4.1	2.4	0.3	4.4
Germany	18.1	11.2	24.9	15.9	7.0	24.8
Ireland	6.3	1.7	11.0	-7.2	-20.3	6.0
United Kingdom	9.6	4.4	14.9	15.5	1.2	29.8
European Union (and the United Kingdom)	16.4	14.3	18.5	24.3	20.9	27.6
Notes: The 2020 Eurobarometer covered July, August and December with some fieldwork in September and November. The 2021 Eurobarometer covered February to April and June with some fieldwork in May and July. The Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS) is an annual survey that was adjusted during the pandemic to produce more timely estimates related to COVID-19. The analysis for 2021 is based on provisional CCHS data that cover periods between January 2021 and February 7, 2022 (excluding May 2021). Sources: Eurobarometer 87.1 to 95.3 (Germany, Ireland, the United Kingdom, and EU [and the United Kingdom]) and the Canadian Community Health Survey, Statistics Canada (Canada).

Across most countries and times, youth who were NEET were worse off in terms of life satisfaction. However, there were notable differences in the level of inequality and trends. The difference in low life satisfaction between Canadian youth who were NEET and non-NEET was relatively stable between 2018 and 2021. In 2018, 3.7%^{Note E: Use with caution} of youth who were NEET were dissatisfied with their lives, compared with 1.0%^{Note E: Use with caution} of youth who were non-NEET. In 2021, the rate of low life satisfaction among youth who were NEET (4.3%^{Note E: Use with caution}) was similar to that in 2018, but there was an increase for youth who were non-NEET (2.0%).

In the European countries, the differences in low life satisfaction between youth who were NEET and non-NEET were generally starker. In Germany, the difference ranged between 16 and 18 percentage points. In the United Kingdom, it ranged from 10 to 16 percentage points. In the Irish sample, youth who were NEET were relatively more satisfied than youth who were non-NEET in 2021, but this change was not statistically significant. By contrast, in the EU, the inequality in life satisfaction between youth who were NEET and non-NEET increased between 2018 and 2021. In 2021, 37.6% of youth who were NEET and 13.3% of youth who were non-NEET across the EU expressed low levels of life satisfaction (data not shown).

Conclusion

The objective of this paper was to explore differences in youth life satisfaction across and within countries during the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite data limitations, this study provided new insights and a basis for future studies. A central finding was the flattening, or even the reversal, of the U-shaped age pattern in life satisfaction in some countries. Life satisfaction seems to have declined to a greater extent among youth aged 15 to 30 years than among people aged 31 to 60 years. This suggests that there were generalized vulnerabilities among youth to pandemic-related hardships. However, there were substantial cross-country differences in the changes in life satisfaction among youth. In Canada, reports of low life satisfaction were comparatively uncommon, with minor changes over 2020 and 2021, the pandemic years. This contrasts with patterns in Ireland and, to some extent, in the United Kingdom, where there were steep increases in the proportion of youth with low life satisfaction. Further reading (see below) illuminates some of the underlying mechanisms within the context of four countries and provides direction for future research.

Acknowledgement

The authors thank Haileigh McDonald for assisting with the analysis of the Canadian Community Health Survey.

Authors

Golo Henseke works with the Centre for Learning and Life Chances in Knowledge Economies and Societies at University College London, United Kingdom. Ingrid Schoon works with the Social Research Institute at University College London, United Kingdom. Christoph Schimmele and Rubab Arim work with the Social Analysis and Modelling Division, Analytical Studies and Modelling Branch, at Statistics Canada. Hans Dietrich works with the Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany. Aisling Murray and Emer Smyth work at the Economic and Social Research Institute, Dublin, Ireland.  Véronique Dupéré works at the École de psychoéducation, Université de Montréal, Canada.

Further reading

Canada

Chen, W.-H., & Hou, F. (2018). The effect of unemployment on life satisfaction: A cross-national comparison between Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States. Analytical Studies Research Paper Series. Catalogue no. 11F0019M – No. 408. Ottawa: Statistics Canada.

Germany

Sandner, M., Patzina, A., Anger, S., Bernhard, S., & Dietrich, H. (2021). The COVID-19 pandemic, well-being, and transitions to post-secondary education. IZA Discussion Paper No. 14797. Bonn: Institute of Labor Economics.

Ireland

Smyth, E., & Nolan, A. (2022). Disrupted transitions? Young adults and the COVID-19 pandemic. ESRI Research Series 142. Dublin: Economic and Social Research Institute.

Murray, A., McClintock, R., McNamara, E., O’Mahony, D., Smyth, E., & Watson, D. (2021). Growing Up in Ireland: Key findings from the special COVID-19 survey of Cohorts ‘98 and ‘08. Dublin: Economic and Social Research Institute.

United Kingdom

Henseke, G., Green, F., & Schoon, I. (2022). Living with COVID-19: Subjective well-being in the second phase of the pandemic. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 51, 1-14.

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