The dynamics of apprenticeships are no longer based only on the increase in entries to higher education, despite the considerable resources granted by the State to promote its development. Since 2008, the number of enrolments annually in the second cycle of secondary education (“seconde” to “terminale” classes, aged 16-18) has declined by 24%. If we consider the choices by young people in the third year of secondary school, we see a gradual erosion of numbers moving into vocational education and apprenticeships. Between 2008 and 2014, the annual number of these young pupils who moved into vocational training fell by 30,000. With the fall in the numbers repeating a year, young people leaving the third year of secondary school are less inclined to launch themselves immediately into the world of work.

Nevertheless, four fifths of the drop in numbers entering apprenticeships at secondary school level is due to the drop in employment, especially among young people, in traditional apprenticeship trades: building, sales, hairdressing, catering, industry and accommodation and food services. Thus the apprenticeship pathway in these trades lost little of its relative attractiveness between 2009 and 2014, although the rise in the cost of labour for apprentices for the employer, introduced in 2013-2014, could modify this situation in the years to come.