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? :(

Not just immigration tho. Our manufacturing industry was killed by thatcher and recently there has been the biggest redistribution of wealth from middle England to the top 1%.

How they do it is live 10 to a house or live on site. Security is then wrapped up too. All is sent home.. Can they cut prices, of course they can. Its a fact.

Funeral business doesn't pay well unless you are independent (and setting up costs) ! I know, as when my DH left the RAF after 22 years full service he trained as a funeral director!! He loved it, but sadly left in the end to be an HGV driver as it paid better

I have four teens/young adults and actually I think Suburb is very wrong.. I don't know a single young adult who feels 'entitled' ..my children and their many friends are very anxious about their futures and most have worked harder than I ever had to.. they have to fight just to find p/t jobs let alone decent careers. Those who go to university are only too aware that unless they are in a very career oriented course then they may well be still frying burgers at the end of it.

I have one DD at university.. and she is studying medicine and has had to work her ass off to get her place.. 60% of applicants DON'T. DD2 is going to do Nursing next year.. also working hard..AND working two p/t jobs... DS1 isn't academic but has worked at all manner of crappy low paid p/t jobs and now at 19 has a support worker job he loves... but it won't pay him enough to leave home.. They have it FAR FAR harder than most of us older ones ever did..

Starwisher.. unless your child is PASSIONATE about a medical career, pushing her is NOT a good idea. Medicine is REALLY tough and getting in is extremely competitive.. they have to be absolutely committed. There are many allied careers tho.. nuring, physio etc but they too are not highly competitive and definitely not a 'well at least you will get a job' choice. Having spent the last 3 years watching my girls go thro the application processes, I can say it's not that easy!

BUT there are still jobs for our children, and if they are motivated they will find them! Housing is a different matter and I think that renting will be the norm sadly as where I live (Oxfordshire) young people don't stand a hope in HELL of buying unless they have family money :/

Wells my 1dd is only 5 so I have some time to go! But she does show a massive interest in the human body so I will encourage he interest by getting lots of books, watching programmes etc.whether this leads to an interest in doctor, biomedical scientist , nurse etc. And even if not then at least I will try to guide her to be sensible unlike my parents.

I have a lot of medical people in my family so I know it's hard but generally the field is stable and pays well plus your not tied down to London areas which is massive good point.

My other dd is 4 months but her only passion we know of so far is eating and drinking!

How comes every eastern european is a plummer, a carpet fitter, a builder? Ummmmm. No they aren't.

They are also shop workers, catering workers, unskilled labourers. But they are not sending money home now like they first did. They are living here with their partners and wives, and are having children, who will be british born, and who will require education and medical treatment. The UK cannot adequately afford to sustain this level of growth.

It's going to be so much harder for our dcs isn't it? I felt entitled to a well paid job when I graduated 22 years ago. It never crossed my mind that I wouldn't get my job of choice.u

My local butcher applied of an assistant at £15k.

Got 45 applicants, most from graduates with degrees in things such as law etc.

I remember when I wanted a summer or weekend job it was easy. You barely had an interview and the mere fact you applied meant it was yours.

This was only a decade ago. Scary how it changes.

I mean local butcher advertised

I agree that our immigration policy has made a bad situation worse. we don't have the resources available. its v hard to get into oz and nz, I've just been looking. we should have tougher immigration rules but its too late now.

Star, that's scarey. Imagine a massive student debt and no prospect of a job. My generation had it easy.

Just been reading that Tiger Mother book and although shocking, it did make me realise how easy our dcs in the west have had things - do what you enjoy etc etc. They are going to have to strive much harder in the future imo.

I will be advising my dcs to work overseas, as DH have done. I can't see any other way to save any money tbh.

Kiss my dh was offered a job in Melbourne

Believe it or not we turned it down as the cost of living is about 2.2 more expensive than here!

He also turned down hong kong as the schooling cost a ridiculous amount.

So while uk is expensive I have now realised it is cheap compared to other places! I would The chance for USA like a shot though.

Love it there.

Btw if you can get an expat package you could be laughing- one that pays your rent, schooling etc

YANBU. It's frightening. DS's best friend from school leaves for Australia later this year. He's given up on a future in the UK.

Yes, expat package is the only way to save any money, BUT (big but) you have to be prepared to go to shitty less desirable locations. DH would be very unlikely to get an expat deal for Australia or Canada, for example, simply because it's easy to get people to go there. Having said that, we're enjoying the challenges these places present.

Yes my dad got three expat deals, and it provided a very interesting childhood. Maybe not most people ideal first choice where we lived but I loved it.

Good to hear Starwisher, because at times we do wonder what our dcs will say about their childhood later!

I taught primary-aged children in the nineties and because I still live in the same town, they recognise me and chat.

I have followed their careers, when they do have careers. I saw lots at the pre-school / playgroups I took DS to and they had four DC of their own. A few tried to mug me and were horrified when they realised that, "it was you, Miss Creepy. I'll walk you home. There are dodgy people around"

They are in McDonalds as teens and soon off to "Uni" full of hope. Four years later they are still in McDs and saddled with debt and wondering why. This applies to both the "bright" and the less academic past-pupils.

One out of hundreds has a job in my son's Special School. Lovely child and now a wonderful young lady who has a sibling with SN and a wealth of understanding and experience.

She is practically illiterate and unable to articulate very well when addressing adults but she has been offered a place on a degree course at her expense which, she thinks, will qualify her as a psychologist.

Vacancies to graduate ratios have not occurred to her to look into despite this information being freely available on the internet. "I never see ads wanting psychologists in the paper so there can't be many people with degrees in it. I'm bound to get a really good job!"

The political climate, welfare and NHS reform, all unresearched and unknown. It is such a waste and a con that I could cry. Especially when I think of our more vulnerable and truly gifted young people

I don't know, I think we are going through a new 70/80's, from right now I think it will get worse, much worse, but then things always have to get better at some point.

I have only been an adult responsible for children since 2003, was a teenager during the 90's. Things did seem fine when I was growing up and first had children. Obviously I am much more worldy wise now and realise that things are really not rosy.

I don't even worry for my Children's futures because the events which could happen between now and then are infinite. It is impossible to know how the world will be in 10 years. There are so many terrible things which could happen, so many great discoveries to be made. You cannot plan that far ahead imo.

Georgia I think they will think it was amazing and a privilege

starwisher But there's nothing to stop you putting your children into local school in HK, which is free- Cantonese medium, but there you go.

The expat packages are going to get fewer and fewer because the skills gap in most countries is getting smaller and smaller and most companies can do 99% of their hiring locally in most industries, unless, as Georgia points out, you're basically prepared to live somewhere "more challenging" and get a hardship package. Even then, there is an increase in "single person" packages- e.g people who are prepared to work somewhere (eg Singapore- very common in IT) and leave their families back home and just send the money home. I know MN is vair sniffy about the migrant worker phenomenon, but that's life for half the world, and could well be our children's futures as well.

I graduated in the early 90's and there were no jobs then either. It's the boom bust scenario that we thought we have seen the back of, but sadly not. I don't think that graduating now is probably that different from graduating then, or in the early 80's when it was pretty grim too.

Not going to address some of the highly xenophobic attitudes here, except to say that the Eastern Europeans had nothing to do with the crash. I do think it is at least slightly ironic that in the same thread you get immigrant bashing and the desire to immigrate. Should you decide to be an expat somewhere abroad, you will then become exactly the sort of immigrant that you are decrying.

I hope so Starwisher. At the moment DD1 says she wants us to move "home" (not that she even remembers living in UK, she associates it with summer holidays, which is not reality) but we have told her that we don't know if that will happen. They all struggle with leaving friends behind when it's time to move on again (every 2 years roughly), but overall I think they are ok and the benefits/priveleges outweigh the difficult side.

When we left UK it was easy for me to get a job in the field I am trained in (NHS employed), but now there are far more graduates than positions available and after a long time away I would be very unlikely to find a job in that area.

We worry about the academic and emotional effects on the dcs of moving them every couple of years, and that they will feel that they have no roots, but not sure that going home again would be a better alternative at the moment.