Young people’s disadvantages on the labour market in Italy: reframing the NEET category

Abstract

The worsening of young people’s condition on the labour market has been described as a long-term trend of contemporary advanced capitalist economies. In recent years, the NEET (not in employment, education or training) label has been increasingly used to assess the integration of young people into the labour market. Does the NEET category adequately grasp the complexity of the underlying processes? In this contribution we will try to answer this question considering the Italian case as an extreme example. Focusing on the features of the youth labour market in Italy, we show the heterogeneity that lies behind the NEET concept, as well as its relationships with the labour market, the education system and welfare institutions. We argue that the institutionalization of NEETs as an analytical category may prove to be problematic as it may fail to identify specific vulnerable subgroups clearly, thereby leading to ineffective one-size-fits-all policy responses.     

An improved PCR method for endogenous DNA retrieval in contaminated Neandertal samples based on the use of blocking primers

Neandertal skeletal remains are usually contaminated with modern human DNA derived from handling and washing of the specimens during excavation. Despite the fact that the distinct Neandertal haplotypes allow the design of specific primer pairs, for instance in most of the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) hypervariable region 1 (HVR1), the human contaminants can often outnumber the endogenous DNA, thus preventing a successful retrieval of Neandertal sequences. We have developed a novel PCR method, based on the use of blocking primers that preferentially bind to modern human contaminant DNA and block their amplification, and greatly improve the efficiency of Neandertal DNA retrieval. We tested the method in four El Sidrón Neandertal samples (two teeth and two bone fragments) with different contamination levels and taphonomic conditions, and we have been able to significantly increase the Neandertal yield from figures around 25.23% (5–69.6%) up to 90.18% (75.3–100%).