Our Work

Youth Disconnection Interactive Tool

Millions of young people in the United States are neither working nor in school. Explore the latest youth disconnection data for yourself in this interactive tool.

Building Bright Futures in Greater Houston

Broad Recovery, Persistent Inequity: Youth Disconnection in America

Broad Recovery, Persistent Inequity presents 2022 youth disconnection rates for the United States as a whole as well as by gender, race and ethnicity, region, state, metro area, and congressional district.

A Portrait of Newark

A Portrait of Newark is an extensive study of well-being across race, place, and gender, and youth disconnection across Newark, New Jersey.

Ensuring an Equitable Recovery: Addressing Covid-19’s Impact on Education

Ensuring an Equitable Recovery presents 2021 youth disconnection rates for the United States as a whole as well as by gender, race and ethnicity, region, state, metro area, and congressional district.

Youth Disconnection in The Rapides Foundation Service Area, 2023

Youth Disconnection in The Rapides Foundation Service Area 2023 provides an in-depth look at youth disconnection in The Rapides Foundation Service Area (TRFSA, which includes parishes in Central Louisiana).

Building Bright Futures for Youth in Los Angeles

Building Bright Futures for Youth in Los Angeles: Spotlight on Young Women provides an in-depth look at youth disconnection in Los Angeles County. The report also has a special focus on young women.

Building Bright Futures for Youth in New Orleans

Building Bright Futures for Youth in New Orleans: Spotlight on Young Women provides an in-depth look at youth disconnection in Greater New Orleans (the New Orleans metropolitan area). The report also has a special focus on young women.

A Disrupted Year: How the Arrival of Covid-19 Affected Youth Disconnection

On the eve of the Covid-19 pandemic, the number of teens and young adults disconnected from both work and school in the United States was lower than it had been in over a decade. Between 2010 and 2019, the youth disconnection rate fell 27 percent, driven largely by the steady increase in youth employment in the years following the Great Recession.

A Decade Undone: 2021 Update

A Decade Undone: 2021 Update, a follow-up to last year's A Decade Undone: Youth Disconnection in the Age of Coronavirus, presents 2019 youth disconnection rates for the United States as a whole as well as by gender, race and ethnicity, region, state, metro area, county, congressional district, and public use microdata area (PUMA).

DATA2GOHEALTH.NYC

DATA2GOHEALTH.NYC builds on DATA2GO.NYC, its sister tool, and provides reliable, up-to-date information on neighborhood assets and challenges across a broader range of health sectors.

A Decade Undone: Youth Disconnection in the Age of Coronavirus

This report, written in the months before the pandemic, presents youth disconnection rates for the United States as a whole as well as by gender, race and ethnicity, region, state, metro area, county, and congressional district.

Making the Connection

This report presents the latest available data on youth disconnection for the United States as a whole as well as by gender, race and ethnicity, region, state, and metro area. It also examines a key factor preventing young people from staying in school and the workforce: disparities in access to reliable and affordable transportation.

Two Futures: The Economic Case for Keeping Youth on Track

Building on Measure of America’s Disconnected Youth Series, Two Futures: The Economic Case for Keeping Youth on Track finds that by the time they reach their thirties, those who had been working or in school as teens and young adults earn $31,000 more per year.

NYC Community Portraits

This site features the community portraits created by nearly 20 NYC-based human services organizations to illuminate important well-being challenges and unmet human needs in their neighborhoods or fields using the indicators found in DATA2GO.NYC.

More Than a Million Reasons for Hope

This report analyzes youth disconnection in the United States by state, metro area, county, and community type, and by gender, race, and ethnicity. It is the first in Measure of America’s disconnected youth series to compare American and European metro areas or to examine disconnection by group characteristics.

Promising Gains, Persistent Gaps

Since Measure of America first wrote about youth disconnection half a decade ago, public awareness of both the plight and the promise of young people who are not in either school or the workforce has grown by leaps and bounds. This report takes a look at the disconnected youth population, what particular challenges they face, and what strategies have been shown to work.

Retail and Opportunity

Past research on workers in the retail sector showed that individuals face many obstacles on the path to economic success. This research investigated how retail employment relates to broader community conditions and individual-level characteristics with the aim to answer three questions.

Zeroing In on Place and Race

Zeroing In on Place and Race is an in-depth look at how disconnected youth are faring in America's cities, with data included on disconnected youth by state, congressional district, county, gender, and by race and ethnicity.

Connecting Youth and Strengthening Communities

This report explores the relationship between civic engagement and opportunity. It provides data and analysis that builds on previous studies that found associations between civic engagement and economic opportunity.

Historical Report of Opportunity

“Historical Report of Opportunity,” the first statistical measure of national and state opportunity levels over the past four decades, uses publicly available data to provide a holistic picture of how the climate for opportunity has changed in all 50 states and Washington, D.C.

DATA2GO.NYC

Data2Go.NYC allows users to visualize where people in need are, what resources are available to assist them, where gaps exist, and how different factors interact to shape the choices and opportunities available to them.

HALVE THE GAP BY 2030: Youth Disconnection in America’s Cities

In this report we imagine, in very specific terms, a different, better tomorrow. We lay out an ambitious but attainable goal: to halve the gaps between the most- and least-connected neighborhoods and between racial groups in half by 2030.

One in Seven

An astonishing one in every seven Americans ages 16 to 24 is neither working nor in school—5.8 million young people in all. This brief ranks the country’s 25 largest metropolitan areas as well as the nation’s largest racial and ethnic groups in terms of youth disconnection.

Goals for the Common Good

This report is a companion piece to the online Common Good Forecaster,™ a joint product of United Way and Measure of America. It takes a closer look at the ten indicators featured on the Forecaster and makes the case for why education matters to each of these critical areas.