placestats

Gender Inequality Index vs. Youth not in work or study

Fades after adjusting for income

Across 159 countries, Gender Inequality Index and Youth not in work or study rise and fall together at r = +0.60 (on a scale from −1 to +1, where 0 means no link). Comparing only countries with similar income (GDP per person) shrinks it to +0.31, which could easily be chance (q = 0.15, allowing for the many pairs tested, and allowing for countries in the same region being alike). So the first figure mostly shows richer countries differing from poorer ones, not a link between these two things. Caution: leave-one-out range spans 0.16 in r.

Comparing countries across the middle half of gender inequality index, 0.151 to 0.491 points, youth not in work or study is worse by 11.6% of 15 to 24 year olds at the top of that range than the bottom. Comparing only countries with similar national income, the gap is 10.5% of 15 to 24 year olds.

Link before adjusting (r)+0.598p = 8.2e-17 · 159 countries
After adjusting for national income+0.306p = 9.4e-5 · likely range [+0.16, +0.44]
p, allowing for regions0.034standard error 0.112 · 7 regions
Check for luck (q)0.145across 12,497 pairs

How to read these.r runs from −1 (one goes up as the other goes down) to +1 (they rise together), and 0 means no link. Adjusting for national income means comparing countries with the same GDP per person, so differences in wealth can’t explain the link. Income is used in percentage terms, since an extra $1,000 means more to a poor country than to a rich one. p is how likely a link this strong would be if there were really none. Below 0.05 means it is unlikely to be chance. Very small values are written in short form: 1.1e-32 means a decimal point followed by 31 zeros and then 11, so very close to zero. The likely range is where the true figure probably lies, and a range that crosses zero means the link could easily be chance. Countries in the same region tend to resemble each other, so the third figure allows for that, which gives a fairer p. The standard error is the typical size of the error in r. Finally, testing this many pairs means some will look strong by luck alone. A q below 0.05 means this link is unlikely to be one of those.

Gender Inequality Index · index, 0 to 1link with income -0.89 · proxy
Youth not in work or study · % of 15 to 24 year oldslink with income -0.63 · high

Both of these rise and fall closely with national income, so a strong link between them before adjusting was close to certain. Read the adjusted figure, not the first one.

“Link with income” is how closely each measure tracks GDP per person across countries, from −1 to +1.

Every country as a dot

Gender Inequality Index · index, 0 to 1 →Youth not in work or study · % of 15 to 24 year olds →0.0030.6773.14%65.7%Afghanistan: 0.661 index, 0 to 1, 43.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsAngola: 0.515 index, 0 to 1, 24.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsAlbania: 0.107 index, 0 to 1, 21% of 15 to 24 year oldsUnited Arab Emirates: 0.04 index, 0 to 1, 8.92% of 15 to 24 year oldsArgentina: 0.264 index, 0 to 1, 15.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsArmenia: 0.18 index, 0 to 1, 20.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsAntigua and Barbuda: 0.24 index, 0 to 1, 20.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsAustralia: 0.056 index, 0 to 1, 8.53% of 15 to 24 year oldsAustria: 0.033 index, 0 to 1, 13.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsAzerbaijan: 0.315 index, 0 to 1, 9.64% of 15 to 24 year oldsBurundi: 0.501 index, 0 to 1, 11.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsBelgium: 0.031 index, 0 to 1, 8.15% of 15 to 24 year oldsBenin: 0.573 index, 0 to 1, 14.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsBurkina Faso: 0.555 index, 0 to 1, 24.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsBangladesh: 0.487 index, 0 to 1, 15.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsBulgaria: 0.208 index, 0 to 1, 10.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsBosnia and Herzegovina: 0.157 index, 0 to 1, 14.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsBelarus: 0.08 index, 0 to 1, 65.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsBelize: 0.428 index, 0 to 1, 24.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsBolivia: 0.419 index, 0 to 1, 8.02% of 15 to 24 year oldsBrazil: 0.39 index, 0 to 1, 18.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsBarbados: 0.297 index, 0 to 1, 29% of 15 to 24 year oldsBrunei Darussalam: 0.257 index, 0 to 1, 19% of 15 to 24 year oldsBhutan: 0.278 index, 0 to 1, 15.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsBotswana: 0.49 index, 0 to 1, 38% of 15 to 24 year oldsCanada: 0.052 index, 0 to 1, 13.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsSwitzerland: 0.01 index, 0 to 1, 6.99% of 15 to 24 year oldsChile: 0.102 index, 0 to 1, 13.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsCote d'Ivoire: 0.589 index, 0 to 1, 18.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsCameroon: 0.558 index, 0 to 1, 23.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsCongo, Dem. Rep.: 0.604 index, 0 to 1, 31.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsColombia: 0.393 index, 0 to 1, 22% of 15 to 24 year oldsComoros: 0.501 index, 0 to 1, 21.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsCabo Verde: 0.298 index, 0 to 1, 28% of 15 to 24 year oldsCosta Rica: 0.217 index, 0 to 1, 19.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsCyprus: 0.252 index, 0 to 1, 13.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsCzechia: 0.088 index, 0 to 1, 4.62% of 15 to 24 year oldsGermany: 0.057 index, 0 to 1, 7.58% of 15 to 24 year oldsDjibouti: 0.481 index, 0 to 1, 44% of 15 to 24 year oldsDenmark: 0.003 index, 0 to 1, 6.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsDominican Republic: 0.417 index, 0 to 1, 24.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsAlgeria: 0.443 index, 0 to 1, 20.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsEcuador: 0.358 index, 0 to 1, 17.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsEgypt, Arab Rep.: 0.398 index, 0 to 1, 23.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsSpain: 0.043 index, 0 to 1, 10.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsEstonia: 0.061 index, 0 to 1, 10.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsEthiopia: 0.497 index, 0 to 1, 17.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsFinland: 0.021 index, 0 to 1, 8.28% of 15 to 24 year oldsFiji: 0.35 index, 0 to 1, 20.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsFrance: 0.034 index, 0 to 1, 12.6% of 15 to 24 year oldsGabon: 0.505 index, 0 to 1, 20.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsUnited Kingdom: 0.083 index, 0 to 1, 14.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsGeorgia: 0.257 index, 0 to 1, 14.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsGhana: 0.514 index, 0 to 1, 23.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsGuinea: 0.609 index, 0 to 1, 34.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsGambia, The: 0.578 index, 0 to 1, 36.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsGuinea-Bissau: 0.632 index, 0 to 1, 13.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsGreece: 0.103 index, 0 to 1, 10.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsGrenada: 0.226 index, 0 to 1, 20.1% of 15 to 24 year oldsGuatemala: 0.48 index, 0 to 1, 24% of 15 to 24 year oldsGuyana: 0.427 index, 0 to 1, 44.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsHonduras: 0.437 index, 0 to 1, 29% of 15 to 24 year oldsCroatia: 0.074 index, 0 to 1, 8.08% of 15 to 24 year oldsHaiti: 0.618 index, 0 to 1, 21.1% of 15 to 24 year oldsHungary: 0.213 index, 0 to 1, 9.98% of 15 to 24 year oldsIndonesia: 0.423 index, 0 to 1, 21.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsIndia: 0.403 index, 0 to 1, 25.6% of 15 to 24 year oldsIreland: 0.054 index, 0 to 1, 5.67% of 15 to 24 year oldsIran, Islamic Rep.: 0.482 index, 0 to 1, 24.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsIraq: 0.558 index, 0 to 1, 36.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsIceland: 0.024 index, 0 to 1, 3.98% of 15 to 24 year oldsIsrael: 0.08 index, 0 to 1, 15.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsItaly: 0.043 index, 0 to 1, 12% of 15 to 24 year oldsJamaica: 0.358 index, 0 to 1, 19.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsJordan: 0.433 index, 0 to 1, 29.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsJapan: 0.059 index, 0 to 1, 3.14% of 15 to 24 year oldsKazakhstan: 0.182 index, 0 to 1, 9.49% of 15 to 24 year oldsKenya: 0.526 index, 0 to 1, 18.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsKyrgyz Republic: 0.34 index, 0 to 1, 19.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsCambodia: 0.506 index, 0 to 1, 6.32% of 15 to 24 year oldsLao PDR: 0.475 index, 0 to 1, 22.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsLebanon: 0.36 index, 0 to 1, 23.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsLiberia: 0.646 index, 0 to 1, 39.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsSt. Lucia: 0.327 index, 0 to 1, 25.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsSri Lanka: 0.367 index, 0 to 1, 17.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsLesotho: 0.534 index, 0 to 1, 38% of 15 to 24 year oldsLithuania: 0.07 index, 0 to 1, 14.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsLuxembourg: 0.044 index, 0 to 1, 10.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsLatvia: 0.117 index, 0 to 1, 9.89% of 15 to 24 year oldsMorocco: 0.438 index, 0 to 1, 35.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsMoldova: 0.146 index, 0 to 1, 9.05% of 15 to 24 year oldsMadagascar: 0.584 index, 0 to 1, 24.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsMaldives: 0.309 index, 0 to 1, 26.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsMexico: 0.358 index, 0 to 1, 16.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsNorth Macedonia: 0.112 index, 0 to 1, 19.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsMali: 0.612 index, 0 to 1, 30.1% of 15 to 24 year oldsMalta: 0.111 index, 0 to 1, 7.84% of 15 to 24 year oldsMyanmar: 0.478 index, 0 to 1, 15% of 15 to 24 year oldsMontenegro: 0.121 index, 0 to 1, 14.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsMongolia: 0.284 index, 0 to 1, 9.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsMozambique: 0.479 index, 0 to 1, 19.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsMauritania: 0.603 index, 0 to 1, 44.1% of 15 to 24 year oldsMauritius: 0.352 index, 0 to 1, 13.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsMalawi: 0.581 index, 0 to 1, 39.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsMalaysia: 0.172 index, 0 to 1, 10.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsNamibia: 0.448 index, 0 to 1, 31.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsNiger: 0.591 index, 0 to 1, 15.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsNigeria: 0.677 index, 0 to 1, 11.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsNicaragua: 0.408 index, 0 to 1, 24.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsNetherlands: 0.013 index, 0 to 1, 4.14% of 15 to 24 year oldsNorway: 0.004 index, 0 to 1, 5.82% of 15 to 24 year oldsNepal: 0.487 index, 0 to 1, 34.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsNew Zealand: 0.082 index, 0 to 1, 12.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsOman: 0.222 index, 0 to 1, 25.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsPakistan: 0.536 index, 0 to 1, 28.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsPanama: 0.374 index, 0 to 1, 15.1% of 15 to 24 year oldsPeru: 0.34 index, 0 to 1, 22.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsPhilippines: 0.351 index, 0 to 1, 12.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsPapua New Guinea: 0.584 index, 0 to 1, 27.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsPoland: 0.081 index, 0 to 1, 10.1% of 15 to 24 year oldsPortugal: 0.076 index, 0 to 1, 7.02% of 15 to 24 year oldsParaguay: 0.412 index, 0 to 1, 18.6% of 15 to 24 year oldsRomania: 0.227 index, 0 to 1, 17% of 15 to 24 year oldsRussian Federation: 0.169 index, 0 to 1, 6.68% of 15 to 24 year oldsRwanda: 0.394 index, 0 to 1, 15.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsSaudi Arabia: 0.228 index, 0 to 1, 16.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsSudan: 0.588 index, 0 to 1, 46.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsSenegal: 0.49 index, 0 to 1, 35.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsSingapore: 0.031 index, 0 to 1, 6.46% of 15 to 24 year oldsSolomon Islands: 0.478 index, 0 to 1, 7.04% of 15 to 24 year oldsSierra Leone: 0.566 index, 0 to 1, 25.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsEl Salvador: 0.362 index, 0 to 1, 20.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsSomalia, Fed. Rep.: 0.675 index, 0 to 1, 51% of 15 to 24 year oldsSerbia: 0.117 index, 0 to 1, 12.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsSao Tome and Principe: 0.492 index, 0 to 1, 43.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsSuriname: 0.391 index, 0 to 1, 18.2% of 15 to 24 year oldsSlovak Republic: 0.176 index, 0 to 1, 8.75% of 15 to 24 year oldsSlovenia: 0.042 index, 0 to 1, 7.13% of 15 to 24 year oldsSweden: 0.007 index, 0 to 1, 5.58% of 15 to 24 year oldsEswatini: 0.484 index, 0 to 1, 36.5% of 15 to 24 year oldsChad: 0.67 index, 0 to 1, 42.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsTogo: 0.564 index, 0 to 1, 13% of 15 to 24 year oldsThailand: 0.288 index, 0 to 1, 12.4% of 15 to 24 year oldsTajikistan: 0.258 index, 0 to 1, 41.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsTimor-Leste: 0.394 index, 0 to 1, 29.1% of 15 to 24 year oldsTonga: 0.444 index, 0 to 1, 25.6% of 15 to 24 year oldsTrinidad and Tobago: 0.262 index, 0 to 1, 15.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsTunisia: 0.238 index, 0 to 1, 22.6% of 15 to 24 year oldsTurkiye: 0.227 index, 0 to 1, 22.9% of 15 to 24 year oldsTanzania: 0.504 index, 0 to 1, 12.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsUganda: 0.524 index, 0 to 1, 13.8% of 15 to 24 year oldsUruguay: 0.218 index, 0 to 1, 14% of 15 to 24 year oldsUnited States: 0.169 index, 0 to 1, 11.6% of 15 to 24 year oldsViet Nam: 0.299 index, 0 to 1, 10.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsVanuatu: 0.556 index, 0 to 1, 29.3% of 15 to 24 year oldsSamoa: 0.416 index, 0 to 1, 30.1% of 15 to 24 year oldsSouth Africa: 0.388 index, 0 to 1, 34.6% of 15 to 24 year oldsZambia: 0.524 index, 0 to 1, 26.7% of 15 to 24 year oldsZimbabwe: 0.519 index, 0 to 1, 36% of 15 to 24 year oldsAFGBLRGNBGUYISLKHMNGANLDSOMSWETCDTJK

best-fit line line after adjusting

Four ways to measure the link

MethodrpCountries
Standard (Pearson), not adjusted+0.5988.2e-17159
By rank (Spearman), not adjusted+0.6641.4e-21159
Standard (Pearson), adjusted for national income+0.3069.4e-5159
By rank (Spearman), adjusted for national income+0.3213.9e-5159

The rank version uses only each country’s place in line, from lowest to highest, so a few extreme countries count for less. The adjusted and unadjusted versions use the same 159 countries: those that report both measures and GDP per person. So the gap between them comes from the adjustment, not from a change in which countries are counted. Drop in the size of r after adjusting: +0.293 (a minus sign means it grew).

How solid is it?

Leaving out one country at a time, r ranges from +0.239 (without GUY) to +0.397 (without BLR). The bar above shows that range on a scale from −1 to +1, with the solid line at the full result. The single country that moves r most: BLR (+0.091).

Fragile: this link may not hold up.
  • leave-one-out range spans 0.16 in r
  • direction is not consistent across regions

Within each region

Countries are not separate, unrelated cases, and neighbors share a lot. A link that holds inside each region is far more believable than one that shows up only when comparing regions.

nr
East Asia & Pacific21+0.42
Europe & Central Asia45-0.13
Latin America & Caribbean27+0.50
Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan & Pakistan16+0.36
Sub-Saharan Africa42+0.20

By income third

If the link shows up only in the richest third of countries, it is a feature of rich countries, not a general pattern.

nr
Poorest third53+0.13
Middle third53+0.40
Richest third53+0.38

By largest religious group

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
Christians99+0.38
Muslims41+0.06

By last european coloniser

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
France22+0.25
Never a European colony17+0.13
Spain18+0.27
United Kingdom51+0.45

Without outliers (countries far outside the middle half of countries on either measure, by more than one and a half times the width of that middle half): r = +0.416 after dropping 3 countries.

Two series, one country

Both measures over the years for one country you pick. The two charts are stacked so they share only the years along the bottom.

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Over time, within countries

Everything above compares countries with each other at one moment. This section compares each country only with itself over 34years. So a link here can’t come from anything about a country that stays the same, such as its history, geography, institutions or culture.

The link shows up within countries over time (r = +0.173) but mostly disappears in year-to-year changes (r = +0.063). That points to slow trends particular to each country, not the two measures moving together from year to year.

Across countries (adjusted)+0.306for comparison
Within countries+0.338each country vs itself
…and vs the same year elsewhere+0.173q = 0.028 · 116 countries
Year-on-year changes+0.063q = 0.109
Read with care.
  • Almost all of this indicator's variation is between countries, not within them, so the within-country estimate rests on a small part of the data.

2,055 country-years (one country in one year), 116 countries, 1990–2023, about 18 years each on average. Share of the variation that happens within countries over time: 7% for Gender Inequality Index, 20% for Youth not in work or study. The margins of error allow for each country appearing many times, and for each year’s value being close to the year before.

Year-to-year changes are a cautious test, not a final answer. Looking only at changes from one year to the next removes each country’s own trends. But it also makes measurement mistakes louder, which pulls the results toward zero. A near-zero result here is weak evidence of no link, not proof.

With one measure years behind the other

0.20−0.2-100+10years Youth not in work or study trails Gender Inequality Index →lag -10: r = -0.061 (n = 1,077)lag -9: r = -0.030 (n = 1,163)lag -8: r = 0.022 (n = 1,250)lag -7: r = 0.047 (n = 1,353)lag -6: r = 0.067 (n = 1,444)lag -5: r = 0.085 (n = 1,526)lag -4: r = 0.088 (n = 1,626)lag -3: r = 0.123 (n = 1,733)lag -2: r = 0.140 (n = 1,834)lag -1: r = 0.140 (n = 1,952)lag +0: r = 0.173 (n = 2,055)lag +1: r = 0.146 (n = 2,111)lag +2: r = 0.152 (n = 2,117)lag +3: r = 0.143 (n = 2,093)lag +4: r = 0.119 (n = 2,064)lag +5: r = 0.118 (n = 2,030)lag +6: r = 0.109 (n = 1,999)lag +7: r = 0.100 (n = 1,954)lag +8: r = 0.096 (n = 1,914)lag +9: r = 0.084 (n = 1,871)lag +10: r = 0.079 (n = 1,826)

Same year (lag 0): +0.173. A peak away from zero does not show which comes first. These series change slowly — this year’s value is close to last year’s. That makes the curve smooth and nearly symmetric, whatever produced the data. Even a sharp peak at one lag (a gap of some years) would not prove that one measure changes the other.

The data


index, 0 to 1
% of 15 to 24 year olds		Years
Nigeria NGA0.67711.9%2023, 2024
Somalia, Fed. Rep. SOM0.67551%2023, 2022
Chad TCD0.6742.3%2023, 2022
Afghanistan AFG0.66143.8%2023, 2021
Liberia LBR0.64639.9%2023, 2017
Guinea-Bissau GNB0.63213.2%2023, 2022
Haiti HTI0.61821.1%2023, 2012
Mali MLI0.61230.1%2023, 2024
Guinea GIN0.60934.3%2023, 2019
Congo, Dem. Rep. COD0.60431.4%2023, 2020
Mauritania MRT0.60344.1%2023, 2019
Niger NER0.59115.7%2023, 2022
Cote d'Ivoire CIV0.58918.8%2023, 2022
Sudan SDN0.58846.5%2023, 2022
Papua New Guinea PNG0.58427.7%2023, 2022

United Nations Development Programme, Human Development Report 2025
World Bank, World Development Indicators

Sources

Gender Inequality Index

Gender Inequality Index

United Nations Development Programme, Human Development Report Office · via Our World in Data · CC BY 3.0 IGO · updated annual

Built from deaths in childbirth, births to teenagers, seats in parliament, secondary schooling, and the share of women and men in the workforce. Five of those inputs are on the site and flagged. It is kept out of the gender score, for the same reason the HDI is kept out of the economy score.

Youth not in work or study

Share of youth not in education, employment or training, total (% of youth population)

International Labour Organization · CC BY 4.0 · updated quarterly

From labour force surveys, so yearly for about a hundred countries and occasional elsewhere.

How this was computed

Data used: most recent value in 2010-2025; values come from 2010–2025. To adjust for income, each measure is first predicted from GDP per person (in percentage terms, on a log scale) with a straight-line fit. Only what is left over is then compared. This is called a partial correlation. The line is drawn the standard way (ordinary least squares), which picks the line that comes closest to all the countries at once. The error margins allow for countries in the same region resembling each other, using 7 World Bank regions. The q-value corrects for testing all 12,497 pairs at once, using the Benjamini–Hochberg method. Underlying data last updated DYB 2024. How the country data works · explore Gender Inequality Index and Youth not in work or study

This page shows that two measures go together. It does not show that Gender Inequality Index changes Youth not in work or study, or the reverse. These figures also describe countries, not individual people. See the ecological fallacy.

More links with Gender Inequality Index or Youth not in work or study