Nearly 1m young people out of work

That was my son for 6 months age 17. His specialist school ended his placement with 2 months notice saying they could not meet need. He had an EHCP but LA provided no education. I was caring 24/7. He is severely autistic and will never be independent or be able to work. It only ended when I got solicitors involved.

I would like them to go a step further and make sure ALL people who are on benefits are put on work and training schemes. Obviously not those who have a disability. But anyone who is not working at all or who is working part-time should be helped into getting off benefits.

It wasn’t just Covid, numbers of NEETS (not in employment, education or training) were rising before then. Covid exacerbated the problem.

Toxic systems and the doubling down of them.

Labour have caused the problem by RR increasing the minimum wage at same time as increasing business rates. She is clueless on businesses.

But they have been raised by their parents. Probably some of whom are posting on here. And they’ve been raised in the current society.

So tell me why it exactly is the fault of young people? They are a product of their upbringing and wider society.

That is plain foolish. Why isn't he signing on? He is missing out on NI stamps

The careers service was quite good when I left school in 1960. They directed me towards the civil service which was a good solid career choice then. Unfortunately I did not like the job. I was sitting in an office working out benefit claims. I left to work as a library assistant. My parents would never have allowed me to sit on my backside at home. All the time I was waiting for my civil service appointment they were pestering me to "get a job" and directing my attention to shops and factories. All they were interested in was to have my paycheck and not to help me get into a career. It was my grandmother who helped me with advice for my civil service job interview.

This is an important point.

Ultimately I think we have got to a place with a lot of young people where they just aren't willing to do stuff that they don't want to do and there is no longer an expectation that you just have to crack on with stuff. They see themselves as the ultimate consumer and think society is there to serve them. The entitlement is through the roof in lots of cases and there is an obsession with their rights, mental health and wellbeing.

You see that at school level too. So many kids dropping out of school to do not a lot at home because they apparently can't cope in school. The reality is that many find getting up hard, hate being told what to do and frankly just don't enjoy school. Unlike in previous generations, they now have the belief that it is entirely optional and that you can just avoid school based obligations if you find them difficult or unpleasant. Is it a suprise that young people find it almost impossible to imagine themselves doing work that there are labour shortages such as care work? This involves putting other people first, having real responsibility and obligations and doing some quite unpleasant things that would be conceptually difficult for them to get their heads around. They are used to being the ones calling the shots.

It's more likely to be because he was proactive in making himself employable and stand out from the crowd rather than the area.

We still call them the WCs 🤣. Bloody loads of them wandering around locally. Sometimes in the road. It was like the day of the Zombies.

I think pay is so low, people at the top earn far too much- more than their fair share for certain - and houses are so utterly unaffordable, having a family so out of reach, that most young people think why bother…

I think to that end WFH has actually been disastrous. Kids just see their parents sitting at home, often still in their nightwear or wrapped in some blanket supposedly working. My parents got up early, put on suits and went to work.

Whoa. Not impressed with some of the posts here putting the blame on young people as some sort of homogenous group of snowflakes and benefit exploiters. Just be grateful that you are in work and have the opportunity to pay towards our collective benefit system - your redundancy or disability might be just round the corner and you might rely on it it soon, too.

As for the young people themselves:

1. Working from home / hybrid roles have made it more difficult for young people to learn from their more senior colleagues, get proper training, or promotions
2. The number of retail and hospitality (as well as public sector, education, and even nhs) jobs has decreased massively due to the economic climate.
3. Getting a degree is increasingly becoming meaningless as there is too much competition (and it's too easy to get a degree)
4. AI has made experienced people more productive, meaning a single person now does the job of 4-5 people, decreasing the size of the job market - and this will only get worse
5. There are not enough junior roles available regardless, and since the minimum wage has increased, employers prefer hiring more experienced people for the same money
6. There have been mass redundancies at bigger firms meaning there is a lot more competition for roles
7. Wages have stagnated, people spend less, prices are up
8. Prices are up, houses are unaffordable even for those on a good income, meaning young people are forced to stay at home
9. World politics, the threat of war, natural crises are all making us more depressed
10. Going out is now too expensive, so people stay at home more, increasing their social isolation
11. We are all addicted to our mobile phones, our brains aren't activated sufficiently, and this has increased social anxiety in younger generations especially
12. Social media and television show a world of fakeness (influencers, love island...) which makes certain younger people feel like outliers.
13. Younger people are less confident and more prone to blaming issues on their mental health challenges, creating a divide with older generations who are more likely to have a 'roll the sleeves up and get on with it' attitude
14. Even startups now don't hire as many people as they used to - see recent news article.
15. We all expect the younger generation to not rely on benefits, but also not live at home, without actually offering them the opportunity to get sufficient income to build up a life
16. We have expectations of work (9am-6pm, work hard, stay late) that are outdated as there really isn't a reason we should all work factory hours and barely spend time with loved ones. Good on the younger generations for challenging this.
17. We are all victims of corporate greed, we are slaves to a system where we are led to blame others, rather than challenge those in power to re-establish fair systems with equal opportunities.

who's talking about social care? they can pick litter, fruits, etc

There are plenty of jobs for which we have to import immigrants from poor countries en masse

This.
My dd has finally got a job - after completing a stem degree at UCL followed by a masters. She has an admin job in London. Basically reception work - the requirement for that job was a 2.1 from a Russel group uni and AAB at A level. 5 interviews later she got the job. Her school
grades are almost all A*s.
She had applied for around 200 jobs over the last year. She’s 24.

The job market is incomparable to when we graduated. It’s absolutely on its knees for 18-25 year olds.

Because the ones that were ok were ok. They aren’t costing anything in benefits and less likely to be unemployed.

It’s the ones who fell apart at Covid who need focusing on.

I think it’s makes sense the figs are inline with the financial crash as economically we are in tougher place & there has been little investment in children & young people since the crash.

Covid was a disaster for some youngsters

Those who had just started university- at the time we said we would have pulled ours out, paid the year and delayed until universities reopened.

It was hard for those who had sat gcse and a’level mocks and then got told their grades would be based on those (like how many pull their socks up and knuckle down for the real things? Everyone I gave ever known until that point!)

And the ones for whom school is safer, warmer, better fed than home.

Some of those NEET numbers are those people.

They certainly can get benefits if they’ve got asd/adhd/another kind of disability. Dsd and her bf both adhd, both get high rate pip! They’re living the life (in their minds)

Is there a break down by age because there is a lot of difference between a 17 yr old & a 24 yr old.
How many are claiming benefits?

Why is it a pointless comment, pray tell?

Rent may not always be fully covered. For a person under 25 the rent is based on renting one bedroom in a shared house. For a single person over 25 it is based on renting a one bed home.

But the full rent may not be paid. Each local authority has a "Local Housing Allowance" (LHA). This is calculated by taking the cheapest 30% rent.

So, if you line up all the one bed properties for rent in a particular area from cheapest up to most expensive then the LHA is the rent for the home that is 30% along from the cheapest.

For the area I live in, the LHA for a one bed property is £575 per month and for shared accommodation is £345 per month.

So, for example, where I live the median rent for a one bed property is around £800 per month and there are no flats for rent for less than £600. A single person over 25 would get £575 in housing costs and would have to pay the rest of the rent themselves.

Even shared accommodation costs £500 - £600 for a shared room.

But they are all soldiers, and could be called on in time of war. Which seems a lot more likely currently than in the past. I am the first generation of my family for over 150 years not to serve in the military, which was not by choice, but because of horrendously poor eyesight. Perhaps because of this family history I am acutely aware of the dangers, and while I would not oppose a child or grandchild joining up if they really wanted to, I wouldn't suggest it.

The job outlook for young teens is dire. It's not just about benefits. 16 and 17 year old don't get benefits. So many of them want a part time job that used to be a rite of passage growing up. But they can't get them.

It's expensive to pay anyone, let alone inexperienced young teens who take time to train. And, if the threads on here are to be believed, absolutely no fucker is willing to go into the office to train them.

There are fewer of the traditional teen opportunities as shops and restaurants shut. Supermarket used to take on loads of teens, they still take some but not in the same volume, they are desperately trying to reduce their payroll and a lot drastically reduced their temporary Christmas staff let alone the normal day to day staff. The smaller pop-in shops also require their staff to be over 16 because of the licensing laws.

So many 'older' people are taking on a second job, or maybe a job at the weekend when the other half can look after the kids. And they will get preference over a wet behind the ears teen because they have experience and can hit the ground running.

My paper boy is a 60+ year old retiree for crying out loud, he needs the little bit extra to make ends meet and he's more reliable than many teens might be.

We were protecting the NHS not the elderly
My kids barely remember the pandemic
Yes it was rough for a couple of years but we cant blame everything on lockdown