Crisis and Youth Inactivity: Central and Eastern Europe during the Financial Crisis of 2008 and the COVID-19 Outbreak of 2020

This paper analyzes eleven Central and Eastern European countries after the financial crisis of 2008 and the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. It investigates the heterogeneity in the labor market among the selected countries based on the youth inactivity, secondary education attainment, and income share of the bottom fifty percent of the population. A hierarchical cluster analysis with Ward's method and k-means clustering generated diverse cluster solutions. A comparative analysis of the four-cluster solutions for 2008 and 2020 showed multiple changes in the cluster composition. The joint groupings of geographically and historically close countries, such as the Baltics, the former Czechoslovakia, and the former Yugoslav republics of Croatia and Slovenia, were identified for 2008. Lithuania emerged as a singleton in 2020. The youth inactivity, educational levels, and income inequality reveal the status of the youth in Central and Eastern Europe during these crises.