Nearly 14% of young people across the European Union have dropped out of formal education or training at least once, highlighting stark national
differences and persistent challenges within education systems, according to new data collected in 2024.
The figures show that 14.2% of people aged 15–34 in the EU interrupted or left an education or training programme during their lifetime. Dropout rates vary widely between member states, with the Netherlands recording the highest share at 32.2%, followed by Denmark (27.1%), Luxembourg (24.8%) and Estonia (24.4%).
At the opposite end of the scale, Romania (1.5%), Greece (2.2%) and Bulgaria (3.5%) reported the lowest proportions of young people leaving education early.
Why young people leave education
Across all levels of education—low, medium and high—the most common reason for dropping out was dissatisfaction with the programme itself. More than four in ten (42.6%) of those who left education said their studies did not meet expectations or were too difficult.
Other significant factors included family or personal reasons (18.5%) and a preference for entering the labour market (13.8%). Financial pressure, often cited in public debate, played a comparatively smaller role: only 5.3% of respondents named money as their main reason for leaving education or training.
Differences by education level
Reasons linked directly to the education programme became more prominent as education levels increased. They accounted for 28.7% of dropouts at the low education level, 35.9% at the medium level and a striking 50.2% at the high education level.
By contrast, health-related reasons, including illness or disability, were more common among those with lower educational attainment (11.1%) than among those at medium (9.8%) or high levels (5.6%).
Family and personal circumstances followed a similar pattern, affecting 24.6% of low-level dropouts, compared with 21.8% at the medium level and 15.0% at the high level. The desire to work also declined as education levels rose, from 17.7% at low level to 11.9% at high level.
Interestingly, financial reasons were slightly more common among students at the highest education level (5.7%) than among those at medium level (4.8%), suggesting that costs remain a barrier even for advanced studies.
The data come from the EU labour force survey dataset lfso_24eab01 and underline the complex mix of personal, structural and educational factors influencing young people’s decisions to leave formal education across Europe. Photo by Craig.Lundsten, Wikimedia commons.