Young people moreover typically lack the financial cushion in the form of savings or benefit entitlements to cope with temporary spells of low income or unemployment. Periods out of employment or education can moreover have negative long-term consequences by giving rise to potentially ‘scarring’ effects, i.e. by permanently reducing a young person’s future employment and earnings potential. Since the beginning of the crisis, the share of highly-educated youth among NEETs has, however, risen in nearly all countries, sometimes substantially: over +7 percentage points in Greece, Mexico and the Slovak Republic, +6 percentage points in the Netherlands, Poland and the United Kingdom.