Young people find it much more difficult to enter the labour market in Italy than elsewhere. The long transition from school to work is accompanied by low employment levels, high unemployment, and a growing concentration of temporary jobs, with the risk of being permanently without tenure. The reforms of the last few decades have increased the flexibility of the labour market, above all encouraging short-term contracts, so as to make it easier for young people to find work. This has led to an increase in segmentation, with young people concentrated in temporary jobs. High youth unemployment was reduced up until the crisis, but at the cost of increased job uncertainty. The impact of the crisis on young people was particularly dramatic, because of the large number of short-term contracts. The worsening of the employment picture has eroded the feeble progress registered before the crisis, emphasizing the existing critical factors. Given the uncertain prospects of growth, the persisting difficulties young people experience in the transition to work risk producing worrying longterm effects.