To think people are overeducated in the UK?

@Crikeyalmighty Completely agree. At the end of the day, now working retail and having some flexibility in my working allows us to have the lifestyle we do with having young DC. I’m not going to apologise for taking “an 18yos job”

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Elite over production is an issue I see evidence of everywhere. But to say we are "over-educating" is perhaps not fully accurate, the quality of education is declining. But the number of people who feel they have jumped through the right hoops and now the doors are slammed in their faces are unfortunately growing.

"Elite overproduction is a concept developed by Peter Turchin that describes the condition of a society that has an excess supply of potential elite members relative to its ability to absorb them into the power structure. This, he hypothesizes, is a cause for social instability, as those left out of power feel aggrieved by their relatively low socioeconomic status."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite_overproduction

Well, judging from general standards of spelling and grammar, not to mention often levels of sheer ignorance of all sorts, I certainly don’t think most people are ‘over-educated’.

PhDs are a rather different matter.

Where are so many getting funding, if they are doing them? A niece in America managed to get funding for hers (eco-science) but lost her last govt. funded job (not at all well paid anyway) because of Trump’s - or rather Musk’s - mass sacking of any govt, employee who hadn’t yet completed 12 months.

A Brit nephew had his PhD (neuroscience) funded, but has since never managed to find any employment paying enough to live on, even at a very frugal level.

A friend’s son is taking forever to finish his (non funded very esoteric-arts-subject PhD) and I suspect that he’ll have the same problem - if he ever actually finishes it.

TBH it’s not a path I’d want to recommend to anyone ATM, though admittedly the floppy hat you get to wear at Doctorate graduation ceremonies is very fetching!!

Love these stories!

But hey who cares !! as I posted on my previous post that other country’s are now a better bet - it’s not a real job it seems for many unless you get your hands dirty and you need to be just applying for any old thing - people were told to that, even on mumsnet - they now have and now posters are objecting because their young adult kids can’t get supermarket jobs etc because intelligent well presented people needing to earn are nabbing the shifts.

To misquote the great aphorist 'Anon': If You Think Overeducation Is Expensive, Try Ignorance

But university is a choice. Surely it is up to those of us going to check out the opportunities, not for others to provide them so we don't get disappointed?

I think raging is a bit much OP. She needed a job and got one.

it’s likely that life experience, skills, ability to see something through (masters) and likely some leadership as well as earned her the job. We all have some transferable skills. She’s probably reliable and because she has kids they know she’ll need the money and stay on.

degrees and study can also be for fun and curiosity. Those Mickey Mouse ones (what are these???) may be ones for enjoyment or to experience uni life.

for funding - who knows?? Same as everyone - mix of loan, family, savings, scholarships etc.

what we choose at 16/18yrs is different from what we want or can do in our 40s. Life changes and shit happens essentially.

UK is definitely not over educated. You only have to read some of the threads on here to know that.

good for her working hard and studying and getting a job.

It’s quite belittling to say “just retail” or to suggest retail is for young ones!

i expect if your son works hard he can all be a manager in Lidl.

I agree: need a job done? Ask a busy mum!

I think it speaks volumes to her credit she isn't too proud to take such a job, and I suspect her employer thought so too. Good on her.

The problem is that there are so few jobs now .Most youngsters cannot get a "little job" at the Co Op or wherever .When I left School .so many kids went into factory work, or simple jobs in offices ,filing and so on .Now most customer Service roles in finance or whatever expect a high level of education and training .No one is "overeducated "some 100,000 school leavers leave without any qualifications at all.Also some 5.1 million 16 to 24 yr olds lack the reading skills of an 11 year old!

I have a PhD. I worked in academia for a while, then left when I got bored. I then worked in a corporate field and made loads of money with long hours, lots of travel and lots of stress. I quit that recently. I'm now working as a gardener which is great fun. A PhD isn't a life sentence. You can use it for a bit and then do something else. Sometimes that something else might be working in retail, where you do your hours and fully clock off! Bliss!

Indeed, sometimes life happens when you are busy making other plans . That’s why a flexible non rigid mindset is a great life skill - some of the people I’ve met in life who are very rigid about careers, partners, homes etc are the ones who end up not coping if life goes to shit or turns out not what they expected

I know a few academics who have no ambition. One is a carer for the elderly. Doesn't want to get a different job and is happy and content with his lot.

I think some people just enjoy studying but that doesn't mean you will use that knowledge or expertise to earn a living. The two are quite different tbh.

@Watdidusay Highly educated retail worker here OP 👋🏼 hello!
Did I accumulate a lot of debt and go to a lot of effort to get my education? Yep 👍🏻 Did I plan to work in retail? Nope. Unfortunately within 3 months of finishing university I had to move home to take on caring responsibilities for a family member. Jobs in my newly qualified field were not available near me, I’d have had to relocate and was unable to do so. So I worked retail shifts locally with a company who were able to help accommodate my caring needs. That lasted nearly 6 years.

By this time I had been out of university too long with relevant work experience to compete with the new graduates.

Sometimes life happens and you just have to go with it.

@Legacy "All this talk about 'useless' university careers annoys me. The university experience is about so much more than just the subject. It's about leaving home and parents, but done in such a way that's there's an instant new community and a safety net/ framework around it. It's about meeting and navigating relationships with new people from all sorts of different backgrounds and cultures. It's also about learning to 'adult' and take care of yourself - food, laundry, healthcare etc. For some it's a chance to reinvent themselves, away from the constraints of childhood friends and family.
Yes, this can be done without the need for a university course, but it's harder and happens less often."

I agree but employers don't care about that stuff. They can just employ a mature adult on less money instead.

All this talk about 'useless' university careers annoys me. The university experience is about so much more than just the subject. It's about leaving home and parents, but done in such a way that's there's an instant new community and a safety net/ framework around it. It's about meeting and navigating relationships with new people from all sorts of different backgrounds and cultures. It's also about learning to 'adult' and take care of yourself - food, laundry, healthcare etc. For some it's a chance to reinvent themselves, away from the constraints of childhood friends and family.
Yes, this can be done without the need for a university course, but it's harder and happens less often.

Except for highly vocational subjects (medicine, dentistry, computer science etc) lots of employers don't care about the subject you studied. They want to know if you're hardworking, a good organiser, a team player etc.

Good news! I thought it was 9.

Absolutely.

Lidl / Aldi are far to savvy to impressed by a Phd or even a masters.

This person MUST have had considerable retail and management experience, they would be absolutely useless otherwise.

Yes I agree a lot of Mickey Mouse degrees.

Yeah, I’m not an economist, but even I can see that what was designed to be positive has had a very serious impact at all levels of hiring. For more senior people the impact is being paid circa 40k less than your previous package, on the basis firms are recruiting at the bottom of their pay bands - to ensure they are not paying more overall. Starmer has a lot to answer for, even amongst the most rabid of Labour's supporters.

Damn. I’m really sorry to hear that. I hope you find something soon.

While I agree degrees are a good thing, not everyone is or can be academic or wants to study that much and I do think that vocational qualifications and skills need much more attention, priority and value. And there needs to be less of clever: academic route, not academic: vocational (or on the scrapheap as there isn't even a course to do our route for you to take.

I was made redundant a year ago. They got rid of half my team and the other half were let go 6 months later. 18 months ago there was a change in board members and two hedge fund managers were put on the board. Since then they have let striped out the company and are only focusing on pushing one arm of the business to the point it can be sold. 80% of the research staff have been made redundant. I know 2 other companies in the field that have done the same so there's a glut research scientists that are now out of work.
In 2025 there were £2 billion of biotechnology projects stopped in the UK and moved to other countries as the UK is looking less and less appealing to science.
I have former colleagues with PhDs and 10+ year experience in working in the field who have been out of work for 6-12 months and can't find a job. The competition is so high and companies are looking for perfect candidates. Some of my former colleagues have had the luxury of living off their redundancy package whilst they looked for work but some had applied to supermarkets the week they were made redundant as they need money whilst they find a job continuing their career. Interview processes don't help either and nearly all the roles have 4 or 5 steps and can take 2 months from the initial application to getting through to the final decision followed by 2-6 weeks to go through the contracts process. Even if you are successful with the first application that you submit on the day you were made redundant you are looking at finding 3 months worth of living costs. Most people don't have the savings to cover 3 months of living costs and redundancy packages weren't always the most generous and are reliant on you qualifying for it.