The anonymous survey was conducted last year by the Labour Market Development Institute, covering 3,200 young people and 75 employers from all over Croatia.
The project has shown that employers often use the requirement for previous work experience as a source of indirect discrimination and a motive to exploit "inexperienced" young people, who often have high qualifications.
Young people face discrimination at job interviews but also in career advancement, which the law defines as direct discrimination, said Nikola Bukovic of the Croatian Youth Network.
Tena Simonovic Einwalter from the human rights ombudsman's office said both the young and employers were poorly informed about the prevention of discrimination.
Labour Minister Mirando Mrsic said more than 170,000 people found employment last year, more than in the four preceding years, but still too few to reverse the negative trends. He expects improvement towards the end of this year and in 2014.
He said about HRK 400 million was spent for the professional training of 9,000 young people last year and that HRK 475 million would be spent this year.
Mrsic said the insufficient education of the jobless was a particular problem, which is why lifelong learning measures are being intensively worked on. The aim is to do away with unemployable jobs, encourage labour mobility and reduce long term unemployment, he added.
(EUR 1 = HRK 7.5)