A Basic Package of Support for youth

Ariane De Lannoy (SALDRU) & Lauren Graham (CSDA) presents the Basic Package of Support (BPS), a person-centred model for young people not in employment, education or training (NEET) that pairs proactive outreach, profiling and coaching with active referral and sustained follow-up. Drawing on pre- and post-testing of 502 participants, it reports meaningful gains in wellbeing and life satisfaction and a sharp fall in NEET status, and argues that multidimensional, longer-term, individualised support outperforms the dominant short-term skills-and-placement approach, because it tackles the barriers underneath rather than just the immediate opportunity. Presented at the 2026 Public Economics Conference.