to think the UK offers a bleak future for our dcs?

[kissmyheathenass]

Looking at unemplyment figures in Europe (Greece and Portugal have nearly 50% youth unemployment), I am wondering what future there is for our dcs in UK. Unemployment is set to get worse and I cant see how things will improve. There will be jobs for the children of the priviledged but what about for our ordinary dcs? :(

I think the trick is to train for a job that will always be in demand somehow. I grew up in the 80s when things were quite bleak and that's why I chose nursing because there'll always be sick people who need caring for.

I totally agree with hiddenhome. There are jobs out there, but we seem to live in an era where too many people expect to be high achievers and see shop work, clerical jobs, and other lower paid work as being beneath them and do not want to work their way up in a career from the bottom. Not every 16 year old should be encouraged or forced to go on to further education.

I would certainly say - don't go to Uni unless you are brilliantly clever. Do something vocational - and get work experience as soon as you can!

I honestly think - due to the high fees thing, there will be a turn around, and industry will once again offer the post school, on the job training schemes that they used to do 20 years ago.

I worry so much too op.

I used too think you should do a degree in what your passionate about.

Which I am hoping now it will be something medical for my daughters, but I hate to admit it even if they are not passionate about something say medi cal with a good chance of employent I might push them into to secure their future

I never thought I say that but they need to survive somehow

Completely agree with PP. I'm going to gently coerce try to show my boys that skills like carpentry, plumbing, engineering will always be required. Besides, have you seen the hourly rate for a plumber these days?

I finished A-Levels in 1999 when the careers advice for anyone with more than a handful of brain cells was "go to university & get a degree or you'll end up working in a shop forever". So I went to university, got a degree and what have I ended up doing? Yup, retail. Not that there's anything wrong with retail. It's just not the clinical psychologist career I'd had my eye on.

My son is 14 and I have never ever felt so scared in my life about his future

I think there was a very short time frame for the "any degree opens any door" attitude. I think it stopped the year I graduated, I really do as people got realistic.

Porto, I hope you right about industry. But we need to start investing now in manufacturing rather than bailing out the banks. Otherwise I think we are doomed.
Òo

I agree. So many young people seem to have a sense of "entitlement"...

Can't remember hearing anyone saying they want to be a bus driver...
or plumber or electrician...

Employment these days means a global market what with the BRIC countries etc.
Africa's coming up fast too, believe it or not.

What do you mean by sense of entitlement suburb?

Starwisher things definitely changed during my 4 years (Scottish university). By my fourth year it suddenly became apparent that to do what I wanted to do wasn't going to be the walk in the park I thought it would be and was going to require at least another 5-7 years studying & work based training.

It does if your child is disabled in any way.....then again the alternatives are worse in most cases.

DD is on the low-end of average academically and although she has a talent for dance and fashion / art, these skills without contacts or initial financial back-up will not cut it. She is interested in driving and there will always be a demand for female instructors (leading to own driving school) so that's an option. Or taxi-driving.

That or she could train to work in the funeral business. There's always a need for funeral directors unless this government take their policies to the logical conclusion and bring back workhouses and paupers graves.

Flossie yes me too. I did a degree because I liked it with no thought as to it's a actual worth.

It did get onto primary training gtp but I think the competion would be so great for the course these days it wouldn't open any doors.

I will encourage my dds not to follow my path,but rather their far more sensible dads who did a degree he wasn't passionate about but knew would provide a future.

It is a awkward time to be make life decisions at 18 though.peronally, I was far to immature and think its a massive pressure

But even with a job, cost of living will be so high here that our dcs will be permanently hardup.

On phone so v slow.

Industry is doomed. It is far cheaper to import (inferior) goods from china than it is to manufacture it in the UK.

People have to be prepared to move away from home for work now. There is very little work on the doorstep in most towns.

I grew up in a town that had 3 huge paper mills, and 4 huge cotton mills. I would say every family in the town had a member who worked in one of them if not more, and it was an automatic presumption that there would always be a job there if you didnt want to do anything else.

That was in the 80's. Which when you are 43 really doesnt seem all that long ago.......

ALL of those mills have closed down. The town is a ghost town now and there is no work at all. The shops are closing down, only the pawn brokers and payday loan shops are thriving.

Payroll is always a good admin role to work in. Everybody needs paying.. and the money is bloody good too if you are a qualified payroller. Absolutely no need to go to university either, get in to a company at 16 as an admin clerk and work it. Employers prefer to recruit from within if they have people who show potential.

Creepy, I was thinking about starting a funeral business today!! No shortage of customers.

Did anyone wonder why? It makes me laugh. Why are we in this shit? Too many people, too many uni promises. Apparently the english are lazy arses as a whole. Ummm no.

But why is the cost of living so crazy?

My dad bought his house 20 years ago for the same we paid for our shoe box.his house is now worth over a million. How the hell did that happen?

I don't know how we will do it but our priority is to somehow get deposits to help out dcs on the housing ladder. I'm not sure through what method but I can't see how they will do it alone. It's horrible.

Immigration has played a part Mojito, but that also comes back to the fact that the jobs were there for the applying/taking. Many eastern europeans are very happy to work hard and do the jobs at minimum wage.

The plumbing fortune is also a bit of a fallacy too along with other "trades". My husband worked in the plumbing trade for many many years, and I have worked in the construction industry almost all of my working life, and there are now a lot of skilled eastern european tradesmen who are getting the work because they are not overpricing themselves.

We have literally dug our own grave in the UK.

Star, its all relevent. Unfortunately there has been a massive increase in numbers. Far too much for us to cope with.. due to labours "multiculture" nutty ways. We are now feeling pinch. All it has done is fill the nhs to near bursting point. Housing is fit to pop.

I'm thinking of retraining in tattoo removal

"too many people expect to be high achievers and see shop work, clerical jobs, and other lower paid work as being beneath them and do not want to work their way up in a career from the bottom"

Well if we have what, 45% of young people going into higher education, with up to 9k tuition fees + living costs, why wouldn't they expect to be a higher achiever on a decent salary?

Of course they can't, because 45% of jobs do not need a higher education. That's a large part of the problem.

Umm, living in the UK takes money huh.. Eastern Europeans as a whole don't integrate and spend here. They undercut and send it home. I would if i were them too, don't get me wrong. How comes every eastern european is a plummer, a carpet fitter, a builder? Ummmmm. No they aren't.